< 

PRIVATE    LIBRARY 

OF 

GEO.  B.  WHEELER 

> 


LIBRARY 

UNIVERSITY  OF 
CALIFORNIA 

SAN  DIEGO 


From  a  Photograph  by  Frank  Rowell 


JOSIAH  WAEREN 

The  First  American  Anarchist 

A  Sociological  Study   by 
WILLIAM  BAILIE 


Boston 

Small,  Maynard  &  Company 
1906 


Copyright,  1906,  by 
SMALL,   MAYNARD  &  COMPANY 

( Incorporated ) 


All  Rights  Reserved 


THE  POWELL  PRESS 
Cambridge,  U,  S.  A. 


TO  THE  MEMORY    OF 

H.  B. 


PREFACE 

The  reader  may,  in  confidence,  be  told  that 
no  biography  of  Josiah  Warren  has  hitherto 
been  written.  When  the  present  writer  set 
himself  the  task,  a  quarter  of  a  century  had 
elapsed  since  Warren's  death.  Most  of  the 
people  who  had  known  him  personally  had 
also  paid  the  final  debt  of  nature.  Of  those 
remaining,  most  had  known  him  only  in  his 
latter  years.  It  became  necessary,  therefore, 
to  conduct  an  independent  investigation  in 
order  to  obtain  the  requisite  data  at  first  hand. 
Contemporary  sources  of  information  were 
sought  and  found  to  be  most  fruitful.  In 
this  way  everything  told  of  his  career  has 
been  verified.  Files  of  newspapers  have  been 
consulted  as  far  back  as  1825.  A  number  of 
highly  interesting  papers,  pamphlets,  patents, 
and  other  documents  relating  to  Warren,  now 
in  the  possession  of  the  New  Harmony  Work- 
ingmen's  Institute,  were  kindly  loaned  by  the 
Librarian.  Almost  the  whole  literature  of 
American  communities  and  socialistic  experi- 
ments has  been  read  for  facts  bearing  on  the 
vii 


JOSIAH   WARREN 

labors  of  Warren.  Hardly  a  book  on  the 
subject  but  has  some  reference  to  him,  though 
in  most  instances  what  is  told  of  Warren  is 
inaccurate,  or  in  the  spirit  of  ridicule,  display- 
ing no  real  knowledge  of  the  man  or  his  work. 

The  Periodical  Letters,  written  and  printed 
by  Warren  himself  during  many  years  of 
activity,  were  found  to  be  the  most  trutsworthy 
sources.  Copies  of  these  are  now  very  scarce, 
and  no  complete  set  is  known  to  be  extant. 

Capt.  George  A.  Warren  of  Evansville,  Ind., 
the  only  surviving  son  of  Warren,  supplied 
information  concerning  his  father's  early  life 
and  many  valuable  suggestions  came  from 
Mr.  Benjamin  R.  Tucker  of  New  York,  the 
founder  and  editor  of  "Liberty,"  a  periodical 
which  has  been  for  more  than  twenty-five  years 
the  faithful  exponent  of  Warren's  philosophy, 
and  which  has  become  recognized  both  here 
and  abroad  as  the  principal  American  organ 
of  the  doctrines  of  philosophical  anarchism. 

W.  B. 
Boston,  JAN.  1,  1906. 


VI 11 


CONTENTS 

PAGE 

Introductory:  The  Anarchist  Spirit  .     .     .    xi 
I      Early  Life  and  New  Harmony  In- 
fluence      1 

II.     The  First  "Time  Store"    ....     9 

III.  Relations  with  Robert  Dale  Owen  .  25 

IV.  Educational  Efforts SO 

V.     Various  Activities 35 

VI.     The  New  Harmony  "Time  Store"  .  42 

VII.     The  Village  of  Utopia 50 

VIII.     Modern  Times 57 

IX.     Inventions  in  Printing 83 

X.     Later  Developments   and    Closing 

Years 92 

XI.     Warren's  Place  as  a  Social  Philoso- 
pher     99 

Appendix :  Letter  from  Josiah  Warren  (his 

last  published  writing)        .    .      127 


THE  ANARCHIST  SPIRIT 

In  offering  an  account  of  the  life  and  teaching 
of  Josiah  Warren,  the  first  American  anarchist, 
it  seems  appropriate  to  anticipate  some  of  the 
questions  that  are  likely  to  arise  in  the  mind  of 
the  reader  by  a  concise  statement  of  the  Anarchist 
concept  at  the  present  day.  Its  place  in  social 
evolution  is  still  ill-defined,  and  even  the  student 
is  seldom  able  clearly  to  differentiate  Anarchism 
from  the  various  phases  of  economic  and  social 
thought  to  which  it  is  related.  While  not  aiming 
at  an  exhaustive  or  complete  treatment  of  the 
subject,  the  following  outline  may  yet  be  found 
helpful  and  suggestive  to  the  enquirer. 

Anarchism  is  not  a  cult,  nor  a  party,  nor  an 
organization.  Neither  is  it  a  new  idea,  nor 
a  reform  movement,  nor  a  system  of  philosophy. 
It  is  not  even  a  menace  to  the  social  order,  nor  yet 
a  plotting  for  the  destruction  of  kings  and  rulers. 
Indeed,  the  social  order  has  often  been  in  danger 
either  from  false  alarms  or  from  its  own  weight 
since  the  fabric  first  arose. 


JOSIAH   WARREN 

Cults  are  common  enough  in  these  days:  — 
they  sprout  and  fade  like  the  flowers  of  spring. 
Parties  and  organizations  rise  and  fall  with 
almost  rhythmic  regularity,  running  their  course 
and  becoming  transformed  with  time  like  all 
things  beneath  the  sun.  Movements  arise  as 
occasion  demands,  and  expire  when  their  work 
is  done.  New  ideas  are  rare  enough,  and  seldom 
retain  their  novel  character  on  close  scrutiny. 
A  philosophy  is  a  scheme  of  life,  an  explanation 
of  the  universe,  a  concrete  intellectual  system. 

Anarchism  is  none  of  these  things.  It 
teaches  not  violence,  nor  does  it  inculcate  insur- 
rection. Neither  is  it  an  incipient  revolution. 
None  the  less  has  it  its  place  in  the  life  of  our 
times.  Modern  Anarchism,  in  a  word,  is  pri- 
marily a  tendency  —  moral,  social,  and  intel- 
lectual. As  a  tendency  it  questions  the  suprem- 
acy of  the  State,  the  infallibility  of  Statute 
laws,  and  the  divine  right  of  all  Authority, 
spiritual  or  temporal.  It  is,  in  truth,  a  product 
of  Authority,  the  progeny  of  the  State,  a  direct 
consequence  of  the  inadequacy  of  law  and  gov- 
ernment to  fulfill  their  assumed  functions.  In 
xii 


THE  ANARCHIST  SPIRIT 

short,  the  Anarchist  tendency  is  a  necessity  of  f 

progress,  a  protest  against  usurpation,  privilege,  I 

j   •   •    A- 
and  injustice. 

"  * 

The  crimes  of  history  may  be  briefly  summed 
up  in  the  words,  —  Abuse  of  Power.  It  is  '• 
a  matter  of  universal  experience  that  power, 
above  all,  governmental  power,  will  be  eternally 
abused.  Nor  can  the  efforts  of  the  most  earnest 
reformers  prevent  it.  No  plan  of  government, 
no  system  of  society,  no  panacea  can  reconcile 
authority  and  equity,  political  power  and  social  \ 
justice.  To  show  the  irreconcilability  of  these 
opposing  forces  in  all  ages,  philosophers  have 
directed  their  wisdom,  poets  their  art,  and  men 
of  action  their  lives.  The  noblest  heroes  that 
live  in  song  and  story  are  those  who  fought  for 
justice  and  right  against  established  authority. 
The  ripest  message  of  genius  and  intellect  to 
the  world  to-day  is  that  a  high  and  worthy 
civilization  can  be  achieved  only  through  com- 
plete freedom  of  the  individual.  The  right  to 
rule,  the  power  born  either  of  ecclesiastical 
domination  or  political  authority  must  fall 
forever.  This  spirit,  which  prepared  the  French 
xiii 


JOSIAH   WARREN 

Revolution,  which  inspired  the  fathers  of  Ameri- 
can Independence,  which  has  held  the  torch  for 
"peoples  rightly  struggling  to  be  free,"  even  to 
this  day,  is  a  potent  influence  shaping  the 
literature,  the  drama,  the  aspirations  and  ideals 
of  our  own  time.  It  is  this  widespread  intel- 
lectual influence,  over-leaping  national  bound- 
aries, uniting  in  common  aims  and  sympathies 
men  of  alien  race,  that  constitutes  the  real  and 
irresistible  Anarchist  tendency. 

It  seems  probable  that  the  government  can 
easily  protect  itself  from  the  bomb-thrower,  the 
self-appointed  savior,  ready  to  give  his  life  for 
his  ideas, —  the  so-called  anarchist,  who  is  the 
ripest  product  of  Old  World  misrule  and  social 
injustice.  But  no  law,  no  Bureau,  no  vigilance 
will  save  the  State  from  the  growing  belief,  the 
idea  which  permeates  the  best  modern  literature, 
that  the  individual  is  sovereign,  that  the  dignity 
of  man  is  higher  than  the  law,  nobler  than  the 
supremacy  of  the  State.  An  essay  of  Spencer, 
a  story  of  Tolstoy,  a  novel  of  Zola,  a  drama  of 
Ibsen,  a  poem  of  Whitman  will  add  more  force 
to  the  Anarchist  tendency  in  one  year  than  the 
xiv 


THE    ANARCHIST    SPIRIT 

opposing  power  of  government  can  suppress  by 
the  most  drastic  measures  in  a  century. 

Did  Diocletian  or  Nero  stamp  out  Christi- 
anity when  they  sacrificed  a  few  victims  to 
popular  hatred  and  superstition  ?  It  is  signifi- 
cant that  in  the  early  days  of  the  Christian 
religion,  when  the  believers  formed  a  small 
struggling  sect,  dangerous  to  law  and  order  in 
the  eyes  of  the  ruling  class,  every  fiendish  crime, 
every  brutal  or  inhuman  act  was  ascribed  to  the 
Christians.  Their  real  offence,  not  indeed 
apprehended  of  their  oppressors,  consisted  in 
disseminating  an  ethical  creed  which  must 
ultimately  overturn  the  ancient  social  order. 
Therefore,  that  moral  monstrosity,  the  yellow- 
journal  Anarchist,  with  bombs  in  his  hands  and 
murder  in  his  heart,  that  shadow  of  the  primor- 
dial chaos,  is  not  without  his  prototype  in  the 
beginnings  of  Christianity.  It  is  not  favorable 
to  the  spread  of  exact  knowledge  that  this  lurid 
creation  of  the  newsman  and  the  police  detective 
should  represent  the  only  conception  of  Anarch- 
ism familiar  to  an  uncritical,  sensation-loving 
public. 

xv 


JOSIAH  WARREN 

The  State  in  the  beginning  was  an  outgrowth 
.of  property,  and  as  the  institution  of  property 
developed  among  men  government  became  a 
necessity  for  the  proprietors.  The  pages  of 
recorded  history  are  filled  with  the  struggles  of 
different  factions  among  the  possessing  classes 
for  the  control  of  the  government.  Laws  in  the 
interest  of  property  have  been  made  to  appear 
as  the  will  of  the  people.  In  past  times  those 
who  suffered  from  the  injustice  of  the  laws  or  the 
oppression  of  the  State  sought  no  remedy  except 
to  turn  the  tables  on  their  oppressors  and  them- 
selves abuse  the  powers  of  the  State.  A  few 
philosophers  and  obscure  thinkers  at  long  inter- 
vals dared  to  question  the  supremacy  of  govern- 
ment and  statute  law  over  the  individual  citizen  ; 
but  these  theorists  were  seldom  heeded  and  their 
tentative  observations  were  soon  forgotten. 

There  is  nothing  new  in  the  opposition  to 
government.  The  difference  between  Anarchist 
theories  to-day  and  the  political  iconoclasm  of  the 
past  lies  in  this,  that  the  modern  theory,  while 
condemning  the  evils  inherent  in  the  State, 
disclaims  any  intention  of  reforming  it  or 
xvi 


THE  ANARCHIST  SPIRIT 

re-creating  it  in  a  new  form.  Wherever  An-  ! 
archism  manifests  itself  it  appears  as  a  reaction  ( 
against  the  abuses  of  government,  and  the  nature  •• 
of  the  opposition  it  sets  up  is  the  offspring  and 
reflection  of  the  government  itself.  The  most 
extreme  forms  of  Anarchism  to-day  are  therefore 
of  Muscovite  origin.  In  Russia  the  State  has 
not  yet  divested  itself  of  its  original  barbaric 
character.  It  is  a  despotism  of  the  most  extreme 
form,  brutal  in  its  methods,  clumsy  in  its  organi- 
zation,\regardless  at  once  of  individual  rights  and 
of  human  life.  Consequently,  a  lawless  form  of 
opposition  has  arisen  of  which  the  terrorists  are 
the  most  notable  example.  The  dynamite  bomb 
as  a  weapon  of  opposition  to  despotic  power  is 
but  the  reflex  of  a  government  whose  organized 
brutality  has  for  generations  been  a  blot  on 
civilization. 

Lyof  Tolstoy,  who  stands  preeminent  the 
world  over,  both  as  a  man  of  letters  and  as  a 
moral  teacher,  proclaims  himself  an  Anarchist. 
His  masterly  pen  is  tireless  in  condemning  the 
State.  With  the  irrefutable  logic  of  facts  he 
exposes  the  true  inwardness  of  government. 
xvii 


JOSIAH   WARREN 

It  is  not  the  abuses  of  irresponsible  officialdom  at 
which  he  strikes.  He  shows  the  evils  to  lie  in 
the  fundamental  nature  of  the  institution.  His 
knowledge  is  too  accurate,  his  perspicacity  too 
penetrating  to  allow  him  to  seek  a  remedy  in 
reformation.  He  is  constrained  to  deny  the 
right  of  any  body  of  men,  even  though  it  be  called 
the  State,  to  rule.  Political  power  itself,  he 
asserts,  is  the  source  of  all  the  abuses,  all  the 
injustice,  invariably  associated  with  govern- 
mental power  wherever  it  exists. 

jJVo  nation,  ancient  or  modern,  has  suffered  as 
Russia  has  from  the  incompetency  and  crimes  of 
its  rulers.  The  rule  of  the  Spanish  conquerors 
in  the  New  World,  it  may  be  objected,  was 
worse  because  it  often  led  to  the  extermination 
of  the  subjugated  races.  And  instances  might 
also  be  cited  of  the  destruction  of  the  conquered 
by  a  dominant  alien  people.  But  Russia  presents 
the  solitary  instance  of  a  government  composed 
of  the  same  race,  with  homogeneous  manners, 
traditions  and  language,  grinding  its  own  people 
in  the  dust,  robbing  them  of  the  fruits  of  their 
industry  by  ruinous  taxation,  withholding  from 
xviii 


THE  ANARCHIST  SPIRIT 

them  every  semblance  of  liberty,  securing  its 
unjust  and  blasting  power  through  the  very 
ignorance,  poverty,  and  superstition  which  it 
fosters  and  maintains.  It  is  not  surprising, 
therefore,  that  the  greatest  mind  which  Russia 
has  produced,  Tolstoy,  the  writer  and  seer,  should 
employ  his  genius  to  undermine  belief  in  all 
government, —  should  deny  the  right  of  every 
form  of  authority  over  the  bodies  and  souls  of 
men.  Having  observed  the  operation  of  the 
State  in  his  own  country,  and  noted  its  pernicious 
influence  through  a  thousand  channels  upon 
the  people,  he  compares  it  with  freer  forms  of 
government  in  other  lands,  concluding  that  the 
principle  is  the  same  no  less  in  an  autocracy 
than  in  the  most  democratic  republic. 

The  immediate  cause  of  the  tardy  surrender 
of  autocracy  in  Russia  was  fear.  Beaten  and 
demoralized,  the  army  and  navy  were  on  the 
verge  of  open  revolt.  They  could  no  longer 
be  relied  upon  to  do  the  bidding  of  the  Czar. 
Thus  deprived  of  the  brute  force  which  had 
alone  upheld  it,  the  government  in  terror  pro- 
claims a  constitution.  It  yet  remains  to  be  seen 
xix 


JOSIAH   WARREN 

whether  the  concessions  extorted  through  fear 
have  not  come  too  late. 

In  England,  after  hundreds  of  years  of  oppo- 
sition to  the  ruling  classes,  the  people  won  some 
rights  and  a  measure  of  equality  before  the  law. 
From  Simon  de  Montfort  to  Gladstone  a  long 
line  of  fighting  reformers  make  up  an  unbroken 
historic  line  of  attack  on  the  abuses  of  political 
power  which  has  shorn  the  State  of  many  of 
its  primal  barbaric  characteristics.  Theoretical 
equality  before  the  law  has  stamped  itself  upon 
all  movements  opposing  the  class  in  power, — 
*o  that  respect  for  the  law  as  law  has  been  and 
remains  the  most  unique  feature  of  English 
political  reform  movements.  The  greatest  of 
English  philosophers,  who  never  tired  of  pointing 
out  the  incompetency  and  folly  of  the  State, 
whose  political  doctrines  centered  around  the 
complete  freedom  of  the  individual,  typifies  in 
his  mild,  passive  Anarchism  the  general  trend 

Anglo-Saxon  opposition.  Under  conditions 
of  comparative  freedom,  which  have  been  won, 
it  is  true,  through  centuries  of  struggle,  the 
assertion  of  individual  rights  and  the  denial  of 
xx 


THE  ANARCHIST  SPIRIT 

State  authority  go  hand  in  hand  with  the  most  I 
moderate  political  demands  and  pacific  methods  j 
of  reform. 

The  radicalism  which  so  strongly  influenced 
English  politics  throughout  a  large  part  of  the 
last  century  aimed  to  reduce  the  State  to  a  mini- 
mum of  activity.  It  opposed  governmental 
interference  with  the  rights  and  liberties  of  the 
citizen.  In  this  respect,  therefore,  its  tenets  were 
Anarchistic.  Herbert  Spencer's  political  doc- 
trines in  general  outline  reflect  this  school,  even 
to  its  weaknesses.  Radicalism  failed  because  it 
could  not  see  that  political  equality,  its  chosen 
ideal,  was  impossible  while  economic  and  indus- 
trial inequality  formed  the  cornerstone  of  the 
social  edifice.  Liberty  in  its  mouth  meant 
simply  the  freedom  of  the  proprietary  classes, 
equality  before  the  law  for  the  various  forms 
of  revenue.  In  a  country  where  a  hereditary 
landlord  class  still  enjoyed  many  privileges 
and  immunities,  it  was  natural  that  those  who 
represented  other  forms  of  property,  the  manu- 
facturing and  commercial  classes,  should  evolve 
a  political  school  which  denounced  special 
xxi 


JOSIAH   WARREN 

privilege  and  demanded  equality  of  rights  for  all. 
And  while  calling  upon  the  masses  to  support 
them  in  obtaining  their  demands,  it  was  also  to 
be  expected  that  they  would  stop  short  in  their 
agitation  at  the  point  where  their  own  interests 
were  menaced.  In  this  wise  it  happened  that 
the  once  robust  school  of  Radicalism  became 
obsolete. 

As  the  demands  of  labor  grew  more  specifically 
economic  in  character,  radical  doctrines  which 
had  stood  for  the  most  advanced  political  thought 
no  longer  appealed  to  the  working  class.  In- 
stead, there  arose  a  socialistic  agitation  demand- 
ing among  other  things  that  the  State  should 
provide  work  for  the  unemployed  and  enact 
a  legal  eight-hour  day.  It  strove  to  influence 
public  opinion  toward  the  opposite  extreme 
from  orthodox  radicalism  and  seemed  willing 
to  sacrifice  individual  liberty  for  a  chance  to 
establish  economic  equality. 

However,  the  intensely  individualistic  quality 

characteristic   of   the   Angle-Saxon,   appearing 

always    in    his    inherent  distrust  of    paternal 

authority,  has  withheld  the  working  class,  after 

xxii 


THE  ANARCHIST  SPIRIT 

a  quarter  of  a  century's  agitation,  from  accepting 
the  doctrines  of  Social  Democracy.  The  com- 
munistic theories  that  have  found  acceptance 
among  the  French  proletariat  and  so  generally 
influenced  the  labor  movement  throughout 
Europe,  have  never  secured  a  foothold  with  the 
English  masses.  Conservative  Trade  Unionism 
has  been  more  potent  because  its  appeal  is  along 
the  lines  of  unaided  initiative,  voluntary  organi- 
zation and  self  help.  Where  it  could  achieve 
results  by  its  own  force  it  put  no  dependence 
upon  legislation. 

In  England  the  Co-operative  movement  has 
succeeded  within  its  chosen  albeit  narrow  sphere 
by  building  on  lines  purely  individualistic. 
On  the  other  hand,  the  Communism  and  Revo- 
lutionary Socialism  which  have  been  dissemi- 
nated among  the  laboring  classes  on  the  continent 
still  remain  in  England  a  factitious  and  hope- 
less agitation.  The  much  paraded  triumphs  of 
Municipal  Socialism  are  disclaimed  by  genuine 
Socialists.  These  civic  enterprises  are  in  truth 
beneficial  mainly  to  the  shopkeepers  and  lesser 
bourgeoisie,  whose  tax  bills  are  reduced  by  the 
xxiii 


JOSIAH  WARREN 

application  of  municipal  profits  to  the  reduction 
of  the  rates. 

Socialism,  as  already  noted,  would  sacrifice 
individual  liberty  for  economic  equality.  But 
the  Anarchist  view  recognizes  the  need  of  both 
political  and  industrial  freedom  as  indispensable 
steps  toward  economic  equality.  Some  basis 
therefore  exists  for  the  commonly  expressed 
notion  which  confounds  Socialism  and  Anarch- 
lsm  as  closely  related,  if  not  identical,  ideas. 
While  there  is  much  in  common,  yet  there  is 
a  fundamental  difference  between  the  two  prin- 
ciples. Socialism  would  lead  to  centralization 
and  dependence  upon  authority.  Anarchism 
would  decentralize,  would  encourage  self-reliance. 
In  the  name  of  Society,  Socialism  would  regulate, 
impose,  define,  command.  Anarchism,  on  the 
other  hand,  would  allow  the  individual  to  find 
out  for  himself  what  was  best,  without  restraint 
or  coercion.  By  law  and  authority  the  one  would 
establish  equality,  would  make  the  citizen  in- 
dustrious, good  and  prosperous,  regardless  of 
his  needs,  inclinations  or  abilities.  The  other 

-    -  •  -         '  -  '•  '*"  v' 

would  maintain  complete  equality  of  rights  and 

.        .^w«w«««^*«W-«™«»»««-'  •••• 

XXIV 


THE  ANARCHIST  SPIRIT 

opportunities,  leaving  it  to  each  person,  singly 
or  in  association  with  others,  to  work  out  his 
own  destiny  in  accordance  with  his  capacities, 
temperament  and  desires. 

Under  various  names  and  aspects  these 
opposing  tendencies  are  incessantly  at  work 
moulding  society,  institutions  and  individuals. 
There  are  certain  general  causes  that  help  or 
hinder  the  one  at  the  expense  of  the  other.  War 
is  preeminently  one  of  these  influences.  What- 
ever its  inception,  it  strengthens  governmental 
power  at  the  expense  of  individual  rights  ;  ii 
increases  bureaucracy,  encourages  paternalism, 
and  correspondingly  weakens  the  opposite  forces. 
Thus  we  find  in  military  ridden  Germany 
a  strong  Socialist  movement  maintaining  its 
hold  on  the  working  classes  despite  the  repressive 
measures  of  the  government.  Teutonic  Social- 
ism, it  should  be  noted,  displays  in  glaring  fash- 
ion some  of  the  most  obnoxious  qualities  of  the 
regime  to  overthrow  which  is  its  avowed  purpose. 
Here  also,  as  in  Russia,  the  opposition  to  the 
existing  order  is  itself  moulded  by  the  system. 
Unconsciously  the  Socialist  movement  embodies 

XXV 


JOSIAH   WARREN 

not  a  few  of  the  features  it  so  vigorously  denounces 
when  displayed  by  its  opponents.  Its  teaching 
is  as  dogmatic,  its  methods  as  intolerant,  as  the 
narrowest  religious  sect.  Its  leaders  and  organi- 
zations are  as  autocratic  as  the  Kaiser  himself. 

Censure,  expulsion  and  excommunication 
for  independents  are  as  necessary  to  orthodox 
Socialist  party  discipline  as  they  have  ever  been 
to  the  Church  of  Rome. 

In  the  United  States  also  the  recrudescence  of 
militarism  consequent  upon  the  Spanish  War 
and  conquest  of  the  Philippines  is  followed  by 
the  growth  of  sentiment  in  favor  of  a  far-reach- 
ing paternalism.  First,  we  have  a  widespread 
demand  for  public  ownership  as  a  remedy  for 
corruption  and  corporate  monopoly  in  our  large 
cities.  Next  is  raised  an  outcry  in  favor  of 
Federal  control  of  railroads,  insurance  companies 
and  industrial  corporations.  Then  this  senti- 
ment becomes  the  slogan  of  the  national  executive 
and  may  shape  the  policy  of  the  historic  party  of 
protection,  which  has  fostered  paternalism  for 
the  benefit  of  the  privileged  few.  The  resilient 
principles  of  either  political  party  would  doubtless 
xxvi 


THE  ANARCHIST  SPIRIT 

bear  the  strain  of  increased  governmental  regu- 
lation. Both  are  equally  ready  to  extend  unjust 
privileges  at  the  expense  of  all  the  people  to  any 
class  or  group  powerful  enough  to  enforce  its 
claims  upon  the  party  in  office.  To  enact  and 
profess  to  enforce  Federal  laws  against  rich 
corporations  seems  infinitely  easier  to  our 
strenuous  statesmen  than  to  go  to  the  root  of  the 
matter  and  cut  off  the  legal  privileges  which 
enable  the  monopolists  to  extract  unjust  tribute. 

While  there  is  small  chance  of  the  Socialists 
as  a  party  gaining  political  power  or  enforcing 
the  mildest  of  their  demands  in  this  country, 
there  yet  exists  a  dangerous  tendency  toward 
increased  interference  by  government  agencies 
in  every  sphere  of  life.  If  this  tendency  should 
grow  unchecked  it  will  ultimately  lead  to  govern- 
ment ownership  in  transportation,  if  not  in  other 
fields.  Not  indeed  because  such  a  step  will  have 
been  found  beneficial,  but  rather  because  irre- 
sponsible official  regulation  must  inevitably 
prove  disastrous  to  every  enterprise  subject  to  it. 

Are  we  to  admit  that  a  people  which  has 
subdued  and  reclaimed  a  vast  continent  in  two 
xxvii 


JOSIAH   WARREN 

or  three  generations  by  individual  courage, 
industry  and  associated  effort  must  at  this  day 
stand  and  confess  itself  unable  successfully  to 
carry  on  its  affairs  ?  Shall  we  believe  it  is 
prepared  to  relegate  to  a  governmental  system, 
already  proved  incompetent  in  its  undertakings, 
the  management  of  the  industries  and  activities 
which  form  the  source  of  its  growth  and  pros- 
perity ?  To  confess  this  is  to  declare  our  progress 
and  civilization  a  failure,  our  race  degenerates, 
our  future  a  dismal  retrogression,  our  very 
existence  a  monumental  disaster.  Only  the 
confirmed  pessimist  can  be  so  wholly  destitute 
of  faith  in  the  people  and  its  future  possibilities 
as  to  accept  such  a  situation.  In  face  of  the 
problem  here  presented, —  the  future  of  our 
civilization, —  the  Anarchist  view  is  hopeful 
and  reassuring. 

Over  against  these  tendencies  must  be  set 
as  manifestations  of  the  Anarchistic  spirit,  the 
prodigious  growth  within  a  few  decades  of 
voluntary  associations  for  every  conceivable  pur- 
pose. With  common  objects  individuals  join 
in  local  societies,  unite  in  national  organizations 
xxviii 


THE    ANARCHIST   SPIRIT 

which  in  turn  form  international  alliances. 
Commerce  and  labor,  science  and  art,  music  and 
sport, —  in  a  word,  all  human  activities,  pursue 
their  diverse  purposes  by  means  of  voluntary 
association  on  the  widest  scale. 

Governmental  organization  embraces  but  a 
fragment  of  man's  activities  carried  on  by  asso- 
ciated effort.  Nor  can  government  functions 
in  their  totality  be  compared  in  importance  or 
extent  with  the  functions  subserved  by  voluntarily 
organized  activities.  Yet  so  much  out  of 
proportion  looms  the  State  in  its  relations  with 
the  individual  that  the  average  mind  can  scarcely 
conceive  it  possible  that  the  functions  now 
assumed  by  the  State  might  be  performed  for  the 
general  good  with  greater  efficiency  and  less  cost 
by  voluntary  non-coercive  agencies. 

Religious  life  in  America  affords  another' 
example  of  voluntary  organization.  At  one 
time  it  was  held  that  religion  could  not  exist 
without  the  support  and  authority  of  the  State  to 
sustain  it.  Yet  who  will  now  assert  that  religious 
activity  is  less  in  extent  or  influence  in  the  United 
States  than  in  countries  where  it  is  established 
xxix 


JOSIAH   WARREN 

and  subsidized  by  government  ?  In  this  country 
we  see  the  various  denominations  working  side 
by  side,  each  pursuing  its  own  course  without 
friction  or  restraint.  Voluntary  contributions 
suffice  to  support  the  churches  of  every  sect. 
The  cost  of  their  maintenance  is  borne  by  those 
who  receive  the  benefit.  No  more  apt  illustration 
i  of  Anarchistic  method  in  operation  could  be 
found.  In  those  countries  in  which  the  com- 
pulsory support  of  religion  still  prevails,  agita- 
tion exists  in  favor  of  freedom, 
"j  Everywhere  the  demand  for  freer  institutions 
'  gains  ground.  To  this  end  no  influence  is  more 
potent  than  literature.  Under  modern  conditions 
its  effect  in  the  formation  of  opinions  and  beliefs 
is  greater  than  it  could  have  been  in  the  past. 
With  innate  facility  it  adapts  itself  to  the  needs 

of  the  human  soul.     Like  the  ocean's  action  on 

1 

the  oldest  rocks,  literature  is  a  solvent  ever 
working  on  men's  minds.  It  dissolves  outgrown 
conceptions,  breaks  down  the  ancient  strata  of 
ignorance  and  prejudice,  and  at  the  same  time 
begins  to  build  up  new  ideas,  hopes  and 
aspirations. 

XXX 


THE   ANARCHIST   SPIRIT 

A  few  instances  must  here  suffice  to  indicate 
the  Anarchist  spirit  in  literature.  The  work  of 
Ibsen,  the  greatest  of  modern  dramatists,  is 
permeated  by  a  steady  purpose.  In  the  plays 
he  analyzes  the  manner  in  which  authority, 
customs,  beliefs,  and  institutions  enslave  civilized 
man.  His  great  illuminating  thought  is  that 
the  individual  should  be  free  to  act  in  the  funda- 
mental social  relations  unfettered  by  false  ideals, 
mistaken  sense  of  duty,  or  the  tyranny  of  public 
opinion.  Moral  courage  enabling  the  individual 
to  dare  to  be  free,  mentally  and  morally  free  from 
superstition,  prejudice  and  habit,  Ibsen  shows  to 
be  the  rarest  yet  the  most  essential  of  virtues. 
Without  it  suffering,  failure  and  unhappiness  are 
multiplied.  When  he  exhibits  the  causes  that 
hold  back  and  stultify  the  individual,  it  is  in 
order  to  indicate  the  better  course.  Away  with 
law,  or  custom,  or  State  authority,  if  it  conflict 
with  the  unfolding  of  human  character.  Such 
is  the  message  to  be  gleaned  from  this  great 
artist  with  a  social  purpose.  Amongst  drama- 
tists whom  he  has  influenced  may  be  named 
Sudermann,  Maeterlinck,  Hauptmann,  Octave 

XXXI 


JOSIAH   WARREN 

Mirbeau,  and  Bernard  Shaw,  all  of  whom  have 
done  valiant  service  in  letting  down  the  bars  of 
outgrown  custom,  convention  and  belief. 

Zola,  in  his  later  work,  and  especially  in  his 
heroic  stand  for  justice  and  truth  in  the  Dreyfus 
case,  gave  a  much  needed  impetus  to  the  cause 
of  right  and  personal  liberty  as  against  bu- 
reaucracy and  clerical  domination  in  France. 
In  Germany,  the  existing  order  —  intellectual, 
moral,  and  governmental  —  has  not  yet  recov- 
ered from  Nietszche's  masterly  attack.  The 
influence  of  this  brilliant  genius  and  aggressive 
Anarchist  is  growing  both  at  home  and  abroad. 

English  literature  also  records  the  aspira- 
tion for  individual  freedom  untrammelled  by  the 
social  codes  of  the  past.  As  an  earnest,  conscious 
purpose  it  appears  in  the  writings  of  George 
Meredith  and  Thomas  Hardy,  both  of  whom 
have  long  since  attained  a  permanent  place  in 
the  literature  of  their  age.  While  George  Gissing 
may  not  rank  so  high,  he  also  had  won  a 
secure  place  in  contemporary  letters  ere  his 
all  too  early  taking  off.  Gissing  exhibited  in  a 
marked  degree  the  influence  of  the  intellectual 
xxxii 


THE    ANARCHIST    SPIRIT 

awakening  against  institutions  and  ideas  that 
had  outlived  their  usefulness.  Like  Meredith 
and  Hardy  his  sincerity  of  purpose,  no  less  than 
his  art,  in  treating  of  vital  social  problems 
wherein  society  and  the  individual  come  in  con- 
flict, makes  a  lasting  impression  on  the  reader. 
In  these  writers  appears  the  note  of  question- 
ing accepted  authority,  the  desire  to  allow  the 
individual  rather  than  law  and  custom  to  decide 
what  is  right,  what  constitutes  moral  action. 

Nor  are  signs  of  the  intellectual  revolt  want- 
ing in  current  ephemeral  literature.  Among  the 
lesser  lights  —  poets,  dramatists,  novelists  —  a 
like  spirit  is  discernible. 

It  might  seem  invidious  to  single  out  from 
contemporary  American  writers  instances  illus- 
trating the  tendency  under  discussion.  The 
topic  cannot,  however,  be  dismissed  until  mention 
is  made  of  two  great  literary  forces  that  have  at 
length  been  allotted  the  high  place  which  is  their 
due  in  American  literature.  To  foreign  observers 
Whitman  is  preeminently  the  poet  of  American 
democracy.  His  sturdy  individualism,  his 
glorification  of  the  average  man  and  woman, 
xxxiii 


JOSIAH   WARREN 

his  scorn  of  mere  statute  morality,  are  finding 
even  among  native  readers  a  wider  and  more 
sympathetic  recognition.  His  strongest  note 
was  ever  a  demand  for  unqualified  freedom  and 
unrestrained  opportunity  for  individual  develop- 
ment. He  chanted  the  ideals  of  liberty,  equality 
and  justice.  Laws,  customs,  conventions,  qov- 

-in^rrnrr-  ' 

ernments,    rulers,    moralities — all    must   give 
_way  before  the  demands  of  free,  vigorous,  sane, 
noble,  sympathetic  manhood  and  womanhood. 

Thoreau,  like  Whitman,  was  recognized 
abroad  at  his  true  worth  before  his  genius  found 
appreciation  at  home.  Now  he  is  accepted  as 
a  unique  literary  force,  a  native  classic,  by 
conservative  authorities.  Yet  of  all  influences 
in  American  literature  his  is  the  most  positively 
Anarchistic.  Not  even  Emerson  himself  was  so 
determined  an  enemy  of  custom  and  authority 
that  stood  in  the  way  of  complete  individuality. 
Thoreau  was  par  excellence  the  Anarchist.  He 
would  bow  to  no  authority,  denying  the  right  of 
the  State  to  compel  him  to  support  it.  He  went 
to  jail  rather  than  pay  a  tax.  His  voluminous 
writings  are  stamped  on  every  page  with  his 
xxxiv 


THE    ANARCHIST    SPIRIT 

ideas  and  individuality.  As  a  tendency  toward 
Anarchist  thought  the  study  of  Thoreau  must 
remain  a  permanent  and  potent  influence  in 
American  literature. 

It  will  be  seen  from  what  has  been  adduced 
that  it  is  not  an  avowed  movement  nor  an  ephem- 
eral agitation  that  constitutes  the  Anarchist  ten- 
dency. Proudhon,  the  French  publicist,  was  a 
thinker  and  original  force  in  his  time.  He 
was  the  pioneer  Anarchist,  to  this  day  misunder- 
stood, misjudged,  maligned.  He  left  no  following 
as  such,  nor  do  any  of  the  numerous  French 
radical  parties  profess  to  carry  on  his  work  ; 
but  his  writings  survive,  are  still  read,  and  exert 
an  influence  that  cannot  be  stifled. 

Another  Frenchman,  a  distinguished  man 
of  science,  Elisee  Reclus,  was  an  avowed  and 
life-long  Anarchist.  His  brother,  Elie,  also  a 
geographer  of  note,  shared  the  same  views. 

From  the  Imperial  palace  of  St.  Petersburg 
was  graduated  the  famous  Anarchist,  Prince 
Peter  Kropotkin.  For  his  original  researches 
he  has  gained  high  rank  among  men  of  science. 
As  a  man  of  letters  his  works  are  read  in  several 

XXXV 


JOSIAH   WARREN 

languages.  The  example  of  his  unselfish  life 
devoted  to  the  uplifting  of  his  fellow  men  has 
inspired  earnest  social  workers  in  Europe  and 
America  and  brought  him  universal  respect. 
His  eloquent  pleadings  for  justice,  his  sacrifices 
and  sufferings,  have  won  him  the  love  of  tJie 
laboring  class  the  world  over.  A  social  force 
that  calls  forth  such  men  has  a  purpose  to  accom- 
plish in  the  future. 

Amongst  the  forces  which  feed  the  Anarchist 
spirit  we  must  reckon  Science.  In  pursuing 
the  investigation  of  facts  it  creates  a  mental 
attitude  that  questions  authority  at  every  step. 
Nothing  is  sacred  but  truth,  and  truth  itself  is 

j_L_il     I      ill  I    --—-^  •****"*"•  "  ' 

relative  and  may  be  absorbed  at  any  moment 
in  a  wider  conception.  Every  genuine  student 
of  natural  science  is  an  incipient  Anarchist.  He 
must  cast  aside  all  imposed  authority,  rely  upon 
himself,  and  accept  only  that  which  is  capable 
of  proof.  In  approaching  the  study  of  political 
and  social  questions  the  scientific  mind  is  com- 
pelled to  reject  almost  the  whole  body  of  one- 
sided assertions,  half-truths  and  glittering  gener- 
alities that  make  up  the  stock  in  trade  of  popular 
xxxvi 


THE    ANARCHIST    SPIRIT 

political  opinion.  Party  principles  consist  of 
class  interests,  personal  ambitions,  and  the  desire  ; 
of  one  half  the  people  to  rule  the  other  half. 
The  impartial  truth-seeker  can  find  in  public 
life  no  high  ideals,  no  love  of  the  common  weal. 
The  State,  instead  of  being  the  guardian  of  the 
weak,  the  dispenser  of  justice,  on  close  investi- 

'   " 

gallon  turns  out  to  be  the  convenient  instrument 
of  strong,  crafty  and  ambitious  men  to  further 
their  own  interests.  Notwithstanding  its  demo- 
cratic form,  government  to-day  as  in  the  past  is 
at  bottom  but  the  police  organization  of  the 
propertied  classes  for  the  guarantee  of  their 
privileges.  Were  it  not  for  this  necessity  to 
uphold  the  privileges  of  property  by  force,  the  • 
State  would  have  no  valid  reason  for  existence. 

The  glorification  of  the  State  as  a  kind  of  \ 
all-wise  providence  has  neither  historic  nor  ; 
logical  foundation.  The  quixotic  belief  of  the  •; 

.  .  --   I     111      I    AMIIII.LJ.    -•LJ.»l_JLi.L,         '„,—  —.       | 

Socialists  that  the  State  can  be  captured  by  the 
proletariat  and  used  to  expropriate  the  capitalists,  \ 
then    afterwards    carry    on   all    the    industrial  f 
functions  of  society  on  collectivist  principles,  is 

economically  unsound  as  it  is  chimerical. 
• 

xxx  vn 


JOSIAH   WARREN 

When  the  average  intelligence  has  risen 
to  a  point  where  justice  shall  have  become  an 
active  compelling  force,  when  the  people  shall 
have  achieved  their  economic  independence,  the 
demand  for  which  is  steadily  growing  and  its 
attainment  inevitable  in  the  course  of  social 
evolution  —  then  the  State  will  have  outlived  its 
historic  function  as  the  guardian  of  capitalistic 
property,  and  must  therefore  succumb  to  the  new 
I  social  organization  based  on  the  voluntary 
principle,  co-operative  and  non-coercive. 


xxx  vi  n 


JOSIAH  WARREN 


JoaiAH  WARREN 

From  the  Plaster  Cast  by 

Sydney  H.  Morse 


I 

EARLY   LIFE    AND 
NEW   HARMONY  INFLUENCE 

Equally  notable  as  an  inventive  genius, 
a  social  philosopher,  and  a  peaceful  revolu- 
tionist, Josiah  Warren  stands  forth,  by  descent, 
by  his  practical,  all-round  talents,  by  the  force 
of  an  earnest  life's  work,  as  an  American  of 
the  sturdy  pioneer  type  whose  brawn  and 
brains  have  formed  the  true  foundation  of  the 
republic.  But  it  is  as  a  representative  of 
ideas  and  aspirations  born  amidst  the  wide- 
spread movements  for  social  regeneration  which 
arose  and  flourished  at  various  times  during  the 
first  half  of  the  nineteenth  century,  that  this 
singular  personality  claims  our  interest.  He 
was  born  in  Boston  in  1798,  of  historically 
famous  Puritan  stock.  The  Warrens  of  Pil- 
grim lineage  from  which  he  sprang  have 
furnished  Massachusetts  with  many  distin- 
guished citizens,  of  whom  the  most  renowned 
was  General  Joseph  Warren,  the  Revolutionary 
hero  killed  by  the  British  at  Bunker  Hill. 
1 


JOSIAH    WARREN 

Of  Josiah's  parents  and  early  life  but  little 
is  known.  He  had  a  taste  for  music,  and  at 
an  early  age  played  with  his  brother  George  in 
local  bands  as  a  professional.  At  the  age  of 
twenty  he  married  and  soon  after  set  out  from 
his  native  place  to  improve  his  fortunes  in  the 
West.  In  those  days  the  city  of  Cincinnati 
was  quite  on  the  verge  of  civilization,  with  the 
vast  unknown  beyond ;  and  when  Warren 
reached  it  he  decided  to  settle  there  and  pursue 
his  vocation  as  an  orchestra  leader  and  teacher 
of  music.  His  talents  soon  gained  him  an 
honorable  professional  repute  which  extended 
beyond  the  city;  but  he  had  other  interests. 
He  devoted  his  leisure  time  to  mechanical 
pursuits,  of  which  the  earliest  fruit  was  a  lamp 
for  burning  lard  that  would  furnish  a  cheaper 
and  better  light  than  tallow,  which  was  then 
selling  at  a  high  price.  So  successful  was 
this  invention,  which  Warren  patented  in  1823, 
that  he  was  soon  running  a  lamp  manufactory 
in  Cincinnati. 

There  were,  however,  more  pressing  prob- 
lems than  those  of  illumination  shortly  to  arise 
2 


EARLY     LIFE 

and  occupy  the  active  mind  and  generous 
heart  of  the  ingenious  young  New  Englander. 

In  the  early  decades  of  this  century  there 
stood  before  the  public  the  unique  figure  of  one 
whose  reputation  extended  throughout  both 
Old  World  and  New  as  the  boldest  and  most 
successful  social  reformer  of  the  age.  To 
Cincinnati,  in  the  course  of  his  public  lectures, 
came  this  famous  character,  and  told  of  his 
latest  plans  for  the  inauguration  of  the  New 
Moral  World. 

Nor  is  it  surprising  that  the  serious-minded 
musician  from  Boston,  whose  sympathies  had 
already  led  to  his  questioning  the  justice  of 
some  existing  social  institutions,  should  be 
attracted  by  the  glowing  pictures  and  immediate 
prospect  of  the  moral  and  economic  emanci- 
pation of  the  human  race  held  out  to  an  eager 
and  suffering  world  by  the  zealous  Robert  Owen 
with  a  fervor  of  moral  conviction  and  an 
inspiring  enthusiasm  which  have  never  been 
surpassed.  Warren  became  a  devoted  student 
of  Owen's  theories  and  decided  to  join  the  grand 
experiment  which  was  about  to  begin  at  New 


JOSIAH   WARREN 

Harmony.  The  lamp  factory  was  sold  early 
in  1825,  and  Warren  with  his  family  joined 
Owen  and  nine  hundred  enthusiasts  gathered 
from  all  parts  of  the  country  on  the  Rappite 
estates,  which  had  now  become  Owen's  prop- 
erty, hoping  to  take  part  in  the  formation  of 
the  ideal  community  which  was  to  usher  in  a 
millennium  of  peace  and  plenty,  brotherhood 
and  happiness,  ultimately  to  embrace  the  whole 
of  mankind. 

Here  was  a  field  in  which  to  study  the 
problems  of  government,  property,  industry, 
and  every  vexed  question  of  social  life,  such 
as  never  before  was  given  to  man.  And 
through  all  the  vicissitudes,  disappointments, 
and  failures  of  the  community  during  two 
stormy  years,  Warren  remained  and  bore  his 
share  of  the  burdens  incident  to  so  pretentious 
an  undertaking.  Not  as  an  embittered  reac- 
tionary, however,  did  he  finally  take  his  leave, 
but  as  an  earnest  and  hopeful  student  who  had 
spent  his  time  to  good  purpose, —  one  who, 
through  witnessing  the  inadequacy  of  com- 
munism to  correct  the  evils  of  private  property, 
4 


EARLY    LIFE 

and  the  failure  both  of  paternal  authority  and 
majority  rule  as  forms  of  government,  had 
learned  his  lessons  and  stored  up  pregnant 
experiences  for  use  in  future  efforts  to  elucidate 
the  same  vital  issues. 

Writing  twenty-nine  years  later  of  his  New 
Harmony  experiences,  Warren  says:  "Many 
a  time  while  in  the  midst  of  them  did  I  say  to 
myself,  Oh  !  if  the  world  could  only  assemble 
on  these  hills  around  and  look  down  upon  us 
through  all  these  experiences,  what  lessons 
they  would  learn  !  There  would  be  no  more 
French  Revolutions,  no  more  patent  political 
governments,  no  more  organizations,  no  more 
constitution-making,  law-making,  nor  human 
contrivances  for  the  foundation  of  society. 
And  what  a  world  of  disappointment  and 
suffering  this  experience  might  save  them! 
But  they  could  not  get  our  experience,  and  so 
they  have  kept  on  organizing  communities, 
phalansteries,  political  parties,  and  national 
revolutions,  only  to  fail,  of  course,  as  we  did, 
and  to  destroy  by  degrees  the  little  hope  that 
existed  of  making  the  world  more  fit  to  live  in." 
5 


JOSIAH   WARREN 

The  failure  of  this  communistic  experiment 
was,  with  Warren,  simply  a  reason  for  trying 
some  other  method  of  attack  upon  obsolescent 
institutions.  For,  like  Owen,  he  never  once 
doubted  that  the  emancipation  of  man  was 
possible,  and  that  human  happiness  was  but  a 
question  of  suitable  social  adjustment  which 
the  application  of  right  principles  would  finally 
solve. 

Accounting  for  the  shattered  hopes  and  un- 
realized aspirations  at  New  Harmony,  Warren 
believed  that  the  chief  causes  were  the  sup- 
pression of  individuality,  the  lack  of  initiative 
and  responsibility.  What  was  every  one's 
interest  was  nobody's  business.  All  the  affairs 
of  the  community  were  decided  either  by  Owen 
as  proprietor,  or  by  the  will  of  the  majority  ; 
personal  liberty  was  at  a  discount,  incentive 
to  sustained  individual  effort  was  lacking,  and 
each  was  inclined  to  ascribe  the  faults  of  the 
system  to  the  shortcomings  of  his  neighbors. 
These  defects,  Warren  concluded,  were  in- 
separable from  any  scheme  based  upon  author- 
ity and  community  of  goods.  Under  the  most 
6 


EARLY    LIFE 

favorable  conditions  failure  would  in  the  long 
run  be  assured. 

/  He  was  convinced,  therefore,  that  the  basis 
/of  all  future  reform  must  be  complete  indivdual 
i  liberty.  '  'Man  seeks  freedom  as  the  magnet 
seeks  the  pole  or  water  its  level,  and  society 
can  have  no  peace  until  every  member  is  really 
free."  This  cannot  be  under  the  existing  or- 
ganization and  ideas  of  society.  New  views  must 
replace  those  of  the  past.  For  the  future  society 
new  principles  are  needed.  The  first  of  these 
is  individuality.  The  sovereignty  of  every  in- 
dividual must  at  all  times  be  held  inviolable. 
Every  one  should  be  free  to  dispose  ,of  his  per- 
son, his  time,  his  property,  and  his  reputation 
as  he  pleases.  But  always  at  his  own  cost. 
Note  it  well.  This  is  the  core  of  Warren's 
principle,  the  element  of  justice  in  it,  the  basis 
of  equality,  the  seed  of  an  eternal  truth  which 
can  no  more  be  refuted  to-day  than  when  he 
first  enunciated  it  to  an  unheeding  world. 

Such  are  the  views  at  which  Warren  had 
arrived  when,  at  the  age  of  twenty-nine,  he 
again   settled   in    Cincinnati.     The   lesson   of 
7 


JOSIAH   WARREN 

New  Harmony  had  convinced  him  that  any 
theory  of  reform,  however  perfect  or  plausible, 
must  be  tested  by  experience  before  it  can  be 
offered  as  a  remedy  for  existing  evils.  To  this 
end,  therefore,  he  undertook  his  first  experi- 
ment, which  was  either  to  prove  the  practica- 
bility of  his  principles  or  to  demonstrate  their 
futility. 


II 

THE  FIRST  "  TIME   STORE  " 

On  the  18th  of  May,  1827,  there  was  opened 
unpretentiously  at  the  corner  of  Fifth  and  Elm 
Streets  in  Cincinnati  a  little  country  store, 
conducted  on  a  plan  new  to  commerce  though 
not  unimportant  to  the  well-being  of  society. 
It  was  the  first  Equity  store,  designed  to  illus- 
trate the  Cost  Principle,  the  germ  of  the  co- 
operative movement  of  the  future. 

When  the  advantages  of  the  store  became 
known  and  its  method  understood,  it  was  the 
most  popular  mercantile  institution  in  the  city. 
The  people  called  it  the  "Time  Store,"  not 
because  it  gave  credit  or  sold  goods  on  instal- 
ments, but  on  account  of  the  peculiar  and 
original  method  adopted  to  fix  and  regulate 
the  amount  of  the  merchant's  compensation. 
This  was  determined  on  the  principle  of  the 
equal  exchange  of  labor,  measured  by  the  time 
occupied,  and  exchanged  hour  for  hour  with 
other  kinds  of  labor.  Let  us  illustrate.  A 
clock  hangs  in  a  conspicuous  place  in  the  store. 
9 


JOSIAH   WARREN 

In  comes  the  customer  to  make  his  purchases. 
All  goods  are  marked  with  the  price  in  plain 
figures,  which  is  their  cost  price,  plus  a  nominal 
percentage  to  cover  freight,  shrinkage,  rent, 
etc.,  usually  about  four  cents  on  the  dollar. 
The  purchaser  selects  what  he  needs,  with  not 
over-much  assistance  or  prompting  from  the 
salesman,  and  pays  for  the  same  in  lawful 
money.  The  time  spent  by  the  merchant  in 
waiting  upon  him  is  now  calculated  by  reference 
to  the  convenient  clock,  and  in  payment  for 
this  service  the  customer  gives  his  labor  note, 
something  after  this  form:  "Due  to  Josiah 
Warren,  on  demand,  thirty  minutes  in  carpenter 
work — John  Smith."  Or,  "Due  to  Josiah 
Warren,  on  demand,  ten  minutes  in  needle- 
work —  Mary  Brown." 

The  store-keeper  thus  agreed  to  exchange 
his  time  for  an  equal  amount  of  the  time  of 
those  who  bought  goods  of  him.  Profits  in  the 
customary  sense  there  were  none.  Here  was 
the  application  of  the  principle  of  labor  for 
labor,  the  Cost  Principle  in  its  most  primitive 
form,  which,  through  experience,  was  subse- 
10 


THE   FIRST"TIME    STORE" 

quently  modified  so  as  to  allow  for  the  dif- 
ferent valuations  of  the  various  kinds  of  labor. 

As  to  the  moral  results  of  the  Cost  system 
in  practice,  it  prevented  needless  waste  of  the 
vendor's  time  by  thoughtless  purchasers  ;  while 
the  marking  of  each  commodity  at  cost  price 
stopped  all  higgling,  and  promoted  mutual 
respect  and  confidence  in  place  of  sharp  dealing 
and  distrust.  While  it  was  Robert  Owen  who, 
in  a  plan  devised  in  1820  to  relieve  the  industrial 
woes  of  Ireland,  first  proposed  the  use  of  labor 
notes,  yet  the  idea  had  not  been  put  in  practice 
until  Warren,  in  his  original  way,  successfully 
carried  it  out. 

His  store  was  also  a  magazine  for  the  deposit 
of  salable  products.  A  report  of  the  demand 
was  posted  up  each  morning,  showing  at  all 
times  what  goods  would  be  received.  The 
depositor,  when  his  goods  were  accepted,  was 
at  liberty  to  take  in  exchange  other  goods  to  an 
equal  amount  from  the  store  or  to  take  Warren's 
labor  notes  instead.  And  as  these  labor  notes 
were  expressed  in  hours  and  not  in  dollars, 
it  was  found  advisable  to  keep  exhibited  for 
11 


JOSIAH   WARREN 

the  information  of  traders  a  list  which  was 
compiled  from  the  ascertained  average  cost 
in  labor-time  of  all  staple  articles,  showing 
their  prices  in  hours.  Besides  this,  the  public 
had  access  to  the  bills  of  all  goods  purchased, 
so  that  no  grounds  of  dispute  could  exist  as  to 
price. 

The  plan  of  accepting  from  depositors  for 
sale  in  the  store  only  such  goods  as  were  known 
to  be  then  in  demand  prevented  a  glut  in  any 
line,  and  avoided  the  mistake  which,  a  few 
years  later,  was  largely  responsible  for  the 
collapse,  after  a  brief  existence,  of  Robert 
Owen's  Labor  Exchange  in  London. 

There  were  no  rules  and  regulations  to 
bewilder  the  public  in  the  Equity  store,  the 
subjoined  notice  being  deemed  by  Warren 
sufficient: 

"  Whatever  arrangements  may  be  made 
from  time  to  time  in  this  place,  they 
will  always  be  subject  to  alteration, 
or  to  be  abolished,  whenever  circum- 
stances or  increasing  knowledge  may 
exhibit  the  necessity  of  change." 
12 


THE  FIRST    "TIME  STORE" 

Although  a  righteous,  humane,  and  un- 
selfish purpose  actuated  all  his  efforts,  Warren 
knew  that  self-interest,  arising  out  of  the 
instinct  of  self-preservation,  is  the  leading 
motive  of  human  conduct,  and  wasted  no  time 
with  reforms  which  ignored  this  natural  law. 
He  believed  that  the  first  step  toward  doing 
good  to  others  was  to  show  them  that  he  pos- 
sessed no  power  to  do  them  harm,  and  "  was  as 
ready  to  run  away  from  power  as  are  most 
reformers  to  pursue  it." 

At  the  beginning  the  Equity  store  met  with 
scant  encouragement.  During  the  first  week 
the  business  done  scarcely  exceeded  five  dollars. 
The  knowing  ones  denounced  it  as  a  new 
scheme  for  swindling,  while  the  friends  of  the 
founder  urged  him  to  give  up  the  pursuit  of 
Utopias,  offering  to  aid  him  in  building  up 
for  himself  a  profitable  business. 

For  several  days  he  had  not  a  customer. 
Finally  he  prevailed  upon  his  brother  George 
to  come  and  make  some  purchases  for  his 
family.  A  few  more  doubting  friends  next 
tried  it,  and  finding  they  were  gainers,  soon 
13 


JOSIAH   WARREN 

spread  the  news.  So  apparent  were  the 
pecuniary  advantages  of  equitable  trading  that 
the  co-operative  spirit  spread  rapidly,  and 
before  long  the  store  taxed  all  the  reformer's 
time  and  energies.  The  merchant  on  the  next 
corner  soon  found  himself  without  occupation 
and  decided  that  the  time  had  come  either  to 
adopt  the  plan  of  Equity  or  to  close  up.  He 
came  to  Warren,  explained  his  dilemma,  and 
begged  the  reformer  to  instruct  him  what  to  do 
in  order  to  conduct  his  business  on  this  new 
plan  and  thus  recover  his  lost  trade.  The 
founder  of  Equitable  Commerce  was  only  too 
happy  to  assist  his  brother  merchant  in  con- 
verting his  place  into  a  "Time  store"  on  the 
principle  of  Equity,  and  delighted  so  soon  to 
see  how  competition  could  enforce  the  adoption 
of  juster  methods  of  exchange.  Both  Time 
stores  were  so  well  patronized  that  the  inno- 
vation affected  the  retail  trade  all  over  the  city. 

It  appears,  then,  that  Warren  in  many  of 

his  ideas  was  the  precursor  of  our  modern 

business  tendencies  toward  more  efficient  and 

economical  distribution,  by  which  the  consumer 

14 


THE   FIRST  "TIME   STORE" 

is  benefited.  His  application  of  the  labor 
note  idea  has  had  numerous  imitators  down  to 
the  present  day.  These  notes  he  proved  to  be 
readily  acceptable  and  always  a  useful  currency. 
Their  practical  function  as  a  substitute  for 
metallic  or  other  legal-tender  money  in  local 
transactions  has  on  many  occasions  been 
demonstrated. 

In  a  diary  that  he  kept  at  this  time  Warren 
says:  "It  has  often  been  asked,  What  will 
induce  lawyers,  physicians,  and  other  pro- 
fessional men  to  exchange  equally  with  the 
now  underpaid  labor  ?  Different  motives  may 
govern  different  people  to  do  so,  and  a  respect 
for  individuality  teaches  me  to  leave  the 
explanation  of  motives  with  each  one  concerned ; 
but  the  fact  is  that  we  can  at  any  time  have  the 
services  of  a  lawyer  upon  this  principle,  whom 
we  should  prefer  to  all  others  that  we  know  on 
account  of  his  long  experience  and  his  uncon- 
querable integrity  ;  and  I  have  on  hand  at  this 
moment  (Nov.  28,  1828),  the  labor  notes  of 
three  physicians  promising  their  attendance 
on  this  principle,  at  least  two  of  whom,  for 
15 


JOSIAH   WARREN 

skill  and  experience,  would  be  preferred  to  any 
others  within  our  knowledge." 

The  Equity  store  had  many  sympathetic 
friends  who  desired  to  raise  capital  for  the 
purpose  of  enlarging  its  scope,  but  the  founder 
discouraged  the  idea.  To  him  it  was  simply 
one  illustration  of  principles  that  were  univer- 
sally true,  leading  to  more  fundamental  appli- 
cations. Nor  was  he  oblivious  to  the  injustice 
of  making  a  single  class  victims  of  a  reform 
before  the  wider  application  of  the  principles 
to  land  and  industry  should  open  a  door  to  the 
eliminated  middleman  in  another  direction. 
Amongst  the  first  to  offer  encouragement  and 
substantial  aid  to  the  pioneer  of  Equity  was 
a  wholesale  merchant  in  the  city  who  once 
declared  to  Warren,  "You  and  I  may  not  live 
to  see  it,  but  the  time  will  come  when  all  the 
business  of  the  world  will  be  conducted  on  these 
principles." 

Some  patrons  of  the  store  had  quite  a  fine 

appreciation  of  its  advantages,  as  the  following 

incident  will  show:  One  day  a  countryman 

came   in    for    a    barrel    of     mackerel,  which 

16 


THE  FIRST  "TIME    STORE" 

was  known  to  cost  eight  dollars  at  the  store. 
Throwing  down  upon  the  counter  the  exact 
amount,  the  rustic  in  a  hurry,  without  pausing 
even  to  take  breath,  cried,  "  I  want  a  barrel  of 
your  mackerel  here  is  the  money  and  there  is 
a  cent  for  your  time  you  need  not  come  out  I 
know  where  they  are  good-by." 

Warren  did  not,  however,  hold  himself 
under  any  obligation  to  extend  the  advantages 
of  Equitable  trading  to  those  who  were  not 
prepared  in  other  dealings  to  act  on  the  same 
principle. 

We  have  seen  that  the  store  was  a  labor 
exchange  where  those  who  had  products  to 
sell  could  dispose  of  them,  provided  the  goods 
were  in  demand,  without  the  middleman's 
seizing  the  lion's  share.  It  was  also  a  bureau 
for  labor  in  search  of  employment,  and  thus 
served  to  direct  the  reformer's  attention  to  the 
long  and  useless  apprenticeships  by  which  the 
common  trades  were  hedged  around. 

On  this  topic  he  writes  in  1827:  "It  is 
painful  to  witness  the  great  number  of  appli- 
cations for  employment  which  the  Report  of 
17 


JOSIAH   WARREN 

the  Demand  does  not  call  for,  and  when  we  tell 
the  applicants  that  they  can  turn  their  attention 
to  work  that  is  in  demand  they  reply  that  they 
cannot  learn  a  new  business  without  long  and 
costly  apprenticeship,  that  otherwise  nobody 
will  teach  them  their  secrets  of  arts  and  trades. 
It  therefore  becomes  necessary  to  disprove  the 
need  for  long  apprenticeships  and  throw  open 
the  secrets  of  trades  so  that  they  can  be  obtained 
on  equitable  terms."  Here  also  was  a  field  for 
the  entrance  of  new  ideas,  a  further  incentive 
to  relinquish  storekeeping  and  apply  the  prin- 
ciples to  labor  and  land  by  means  of  a  co- 
operative village. 

Some  light  is  thrown  on  the  character  of  the 
young  reformer,  as  estimated  by  those  who 
knew  him  when  he  opened  the  store  in  Cin- 
cinnati, by  the  fact  that  he  procured  the  requi- 
site capital  from  the  United  States  Bank  on  his 
personal  notes  endorsed  by  two  gentlemen, 
the  one  a  pillar  of  the  Methodist  Episcopal 
Church,  the  other  a  prominent  Presbyterian, 
while  both  of  them  knew  that  Warren  repudi- 
ated all  systems  of  theology.  His  Methodist 
18 


THE  FIRST  "TIME  STORE" 
friend,  Captain  Richard  Folger,  was  an  ardent 
believer  in  Equity  as  shown  by  the  following 
story,  related  by  Warren :  Once,  when  his  co-re- 
ligionists were  disputing  on  some  point  of  faith, 
the  Captain  said  to  them,  "Well,  brethren, 
people  have  been  disputing  for  eighteen  hun- 
dred years  about  what  is  the  true  Christianity. 
Now  if  you  will  go  down  to  the  corner  of 
Fifth  and  Elm  Streets,  you  will  see  it  in  opera- 
tion for  the  first  time  in  the  world." 

It  was  the  same  friend  who,  on  receiving 
labor  notes  at  the  store  in  exchange  for  a  con- 
signment of  corn  meal,  stopped  his  own  work 
and  spent  three  weeks  in  going  around  among 
his  acquaintances  from  shop  to  shop  expound- 
ing the  principles  of  Equitable  Commerce  and 
explaining  their  practical  working,  concluding 
his  remarks  by  giving  each  listener  one  of 
the  labor  notes  with  which  to  try  the  experiment 
at  the  Time  store. 

Another  incident  occurring  about  this  time 
so  well  illustrates  the  practice  as  well  as  the 
views  of  Warren  upon  interest  and  money- 
lending  that  I  venture  here  to  relate  it. 
19 


JOSIAH   WARREN 

One  day  a  friend  came  to  the  store  and 
introduced  to  Warren  a  man  whom  the  friend 
knew  but  who  was  then  a  stranger  to  the  store- 
keeper. This  man  was  about  to  be  turned  out 
of  his  house  and  his  furniture  seized  and  sold 
that  day  in  default  of  the  payment  of  thirteen 
dollars  due  for  rent.  Having  experienced 
misfortunes  that  left  him  penniless,  the  stranger 
was  in  sore  straits.  If  he  could  only  borrow 
the  money  he  would  be  able  to  repay  it  in  two 
weeks,  while  his  friend,  with  whom  Warren 
was  well  acquainted,  was  willing  to  become 
security.  From  the  contingent  fund  of  the 
store  Warren  readily  agreed  to  lend  the  money. 
At  the  end  of  a  fortnight  the  stranger  came  to 
Warren  and  declared,  "Your  loan  saved  my 
family  from  so  much  distress  that  I  will  gladly 
pay  you  any  premium  you  choose  to  ask." 

"You  are  a  stranger,"  replied  the  reformer, 
"  to  the  principles  upon  which  business  is  done 
here." 

"  But  I  can  never  feel  myself  absolved  from 
obligation  to  you  at  any  price.     Take  whatever 
you  please  ;  I  shall  not  question  it." 
20 


THE   FIRST  "TIME    STORE" 

"  I  see,"  rejoined  Warren,  "  that  your  friend 
has  not  informed  you  of  the  peculiar  operation 
of  our  principles  as  applied  to  lending  money. 
The  compensation,  or  interest,  has  no  reference 
to  the  benefit  conferred  upon  the  borrower, 
but  is  based  entirely  on  the  cost  to  the  lender. 
I  employed  about  five  minutes  in  lending  the 
money  and  shall  employ  about  the  same  time 
in  receiving  it  back.  It  was  secured  and  there 
was  no  risk  or  loss.  You  have  only  to  com- 
pensate me  for  my  labor.  If  you  could  give  me 
an  equivalent  in  your  own  labor,  that  would 
make  it  all  right,  but  as  you  cannot  do  so,  I 
will  accept  from  you  instead  seven  cents  in 
money." 

"I  don't  understand  you  ;  I  am  really  in 
earnest  in  what  I  say.  I  am  anxious  to  pay 
properly  for  the  great  benefit  you  have  conferred 
on  me  and  my  family." 

"Yes,"  returned  the  lender,  "I  perfectly 
understand  you :  I  am  to  be  properly  paid,  and 
shall  be  with  the  seven  cents.  Don't  you  think 
I  ought  to  be  satisfied  with  fifty  cents  an  hour 
for  my  labor  in  lending  money  when  the  hardest 
21 


JOSIAH   WARREN 

working  man  gets  only  fifty  cents  for  a  whole 
day's  labor?" 

Here  we  have  a  concrete  example  of  the 
meaning  of  Cost  as  the  Limit  of  Price.  Though 
an  economic  doctrine,  and  the  cornerstone  of 
Warren's  political  economy,  it  broadly  com- 
prehends an  ethical  principle  which  would 
have  to  be  accepted  intelligently  as  the  basis 
of  all  pecuniary  and  commercial  relations 
before  the  Cost  Principle  could  be  universally 
practised.  By  Cost  he  meant  the  sacrifices 
involved,  which  time  alone  could  not  measure, 
and  the  price,  therefore,  should  never  exceed 
the  cost  thus  determined. 

Full  of  enthusiasm  for  the  principles  which 
he  was  now  convinced  would  solve  the  deeper 
economic  problems  of  society,  having  tried 
them  in  regard  to  the  distribution  of  wealth, 
he  longed  to  see  them  applied  to  its  production  ; 
and  in  order  to  be  free  to  set  about  the  task  he 
decided  to  terminate  the  store  experiment. 
Measures  were  accordingly  taken  to  this  end. 
The  public  had  several  months'  notice,  all 
obligations  were  met,  and  after  two  years' 
22 


THE  FIRST   "TIME   STORE" 

successful  operations  the  reformer  found  him- 
self financially  in  the  same  position  as  at  the 
beginning,  but  morally  more  than  ever  con- 
vinced of  the  beauties  of  Equity  and  the  need 
of  its  realization.  He  would  "carry  out  the 
principles  into  all  ramifications  of  social  life,  on 
a  permanent  location,"  where  land  could  be 
had  at  a  price  not  already  prohibitively  en- 
hanced by  speculation. 

During  Warren's  first  residence  in  Cincin- 
nati, he  obtained  a  lease  for  ninety-nine  years 
from  Mr.  Nicholas  Longworth,  the  well-known 
real  estate  owner,  of  a  property  extending 
from  Elm  to  John  Streets  and  from  Fifth  to 
Ninth  Streets,  giving  him  eight  blocks  of  the 
best  building  land  in  Cincinnati.  Upon  this 
estate  he  built  a  few  brick  houses,  in  one  of 
which  he  lived  for  several  years.  It  was  here 
at  the  corner  of  Fifth  and  Elm  Streets,  that  he 
set  up  his  first  Equity  store.  After  the  store 
was  terminated,  the  intensity  of  Warren's 
convictions  deepened  in  regard  to  holding  land 
for  speculative  purposes.  Believing  as  he  did 
that  the  only  legitimate  title  to  property  is 
23 


JOSIAH   WARREN 

labor,  that  wealth  acquired  by  the  rise  of  land 
values,  due  not  to  any  action  of  the  individual 
owner  but  to  social  causes  beyond  his  control, 
is  opposed  to  the  principle  of  Equity,  he  felt 
that  he  could  no  longer  retain  his  title  to  an 
estate  whose  value  would  continue  to  augment 
without  any  effort  on  the  part  of  the  possessor. 
He  therefore  went  to  Mr.  Longworth  and 
returned  unconditionally  the  lease  he  held, 
thus  voluntarily  depriving  himself  of  property 
rights  which,  had  he  chosen  to  retain  them, 
would,  before  many  years  elapsed,  have  made 
him  a  wealthy  man. 


Ill 

RELATIONS  WITH 
ROBERT  DALE  OWEN 

Like  all  earnest  workers  for  righteousness 
in  human  relations,  Warren  was  doomed  to 
many  a  disappointment,  to  see  many  a  hope 
unfulfilled,  many  a  promising  scheme  nipped 
in  the  bud,  ere  time  and  circumstance  converged 
to  carry  out  his  aspirations.  No  less  an 
enthusiast  in  the  same  cause  was  Robert  Dale 
Owen,  who,  when  Warren  was  brimful  of  ideas 
concerning  a  co-operative  village,  called  upon 
him  in  Cincinnati.  Owen  was  wealthy,  and, 
in  association  with  Frances  Wright,  was  at  that 
time  editor  and  proprietor  of  an  influential 
organ  of  social  reform,  The  Free  Enquirer, 
published  in  New  York.  He  evinced  much 
interest  in  Warren's  views,  invited  him  to  come 
to  New  York,  offered  to  furnish  means  to 
found  an  institution  in  that  city  devoted  to 
Equitable  Commerce,  pointed  out  the  good 
that  might  be  accomplished  by  the  press  and 
other  avenues  of  educational  propaganda  that 
25 


JOSIAH   WARREN 

he  controlled,  and  held  out  hopes  of  assisting 
in  the  formation  of  communities  based  on 
Equity  and  individual  sovereignty. 

Warren  was  completely  won  by  Owen's 
enthusiasm  and  generosity,  and  toward  the 
middle  of  the  year  1830  he  went  to  New  York. 
Here  he  met  "Fanny"  Wright,  the  first  woman 
abolitionist.  Popular  and  convincing  as  a 
lecturer,  clear-headed  and  fearless  as  a  reformer, 
scholarly  and  powerful  as  a  writer,  she  was 
a  force  worthy  of  being  won  to  the  Principles. 
Frances  Wright  was  not  a  communist,  though 
she  had  spent  some  time  with  Robert  Owen 
at  New  Harmony  ;  her  intellectual  leanings 
were  individualistic,  and  Warren  found  an 
eager  and  sympathetic  listener  to  his  exposition 
of  his  opinions.  She  understood  and  accepted 
the  Principles,  and  her  work  was  henceforth 
inspired  by  Warren's  social  philosophy. 

At  this  time  she  was  writing  most  of  the 
editorials  for  The  Free  Enquirer,  and  the  new 
influence  soon  became  apparent.  In  a  series 
of  articles  on  "Wealth  and  Money"  we  can 
trace  this  influence,  and  in  the  seventh  article, 


RELATIONS  WITH  OWEN 

under  date  of  Oct.  23,  1830,  Frances  Wright 
pays  a  tribute  to  Josiah  Warren  which  is  so 
important  as  a  contemporary  estimate  of  his 
ideas  and  the  work  he  did  in  the  first  Time 
store  that  I  quote  the  following  passage : 

"  He  withdrew  to  Cincinnati  and  there  spent 
two  years  in  an  experiment  which,  for  the 
quiet,  unpretending  perseverance  with  which 
it  was  conducted,  no  less  than  for  the  important 
truths  it  satisfactorily  elucidated,  has  perhaps 
few  parallels.  Unaided  by  money,  unbacked 
by  influence,  and  unseconded  save  by  his  own 
conviction  of  the  value  of  the  principle  he  had 
seized,  and  the  beneficial  consequences  of  the 
practice  he  was  prepared  to  explore,  he  suc- 
ceeded in  exhibiting  to  the  understanding  and 
bringing  home  to  the  worldly  interests  of 
thousands  the  perfect  facility  of  living  in  plenty 
with  one-third  of  the  labor  and  without  any 
of  the  anxiety  inseparable  from  the  existing 
moneyed  exchange  of  the  world. 

"  But  the  advantage  arising  from  this  new, 
and,  we  are  prepared  to  say,  correct  principle 
of  commerce  to  the  physical  condition  of  man- 
27 


JOSIAH   WARREN 

kind  embraces  but  half  its  virtues.  Its  moral 
tendencies  may  be  traced  with  never-ending 
delight  by  every  intelligent  and  benevolent 
mind.  While  it  imparts  every  honest  incite- 
ment to  industry,  it  removes  all  temptation  to 
fraud  and  all  possibility  of  ruinous  and  corrupt- 
ing speculation.  It  is  capable  of  opening  to 
every  human  being  the  path  of  honest  inde- 
pendence and  removing  the  load  of  oppression 
which  now  weighs  upon  youthful  as  upon 
female  labor,  of  encouraging  the  outcast  and 
the  vagrant  to  engage  in  virtuous  exertions 
and  honorable  occupations,  secure  from  the 
contumely  of  the  pharisee  and  the  blighting 
suspicion  of  an  unfeeling  generation,  and  of 
restoring  to  the  human  race  that  first  best 
birthright  held  in  virtue  of  existence, —  indi- 
vidual, entire,  and  equal  liberty." 

Warren  at  this  period,  as  indeed  at  all  times, 
was  unobtrusively  modest,  and  seldom  allowed 
his  name  to  appear  in  print.  The  notes  on 
equal  exchange  of  labor  in  The  Free  Enquirer 
for  July,  1830,  are  signed  "  J.  W.,"  as  is  also 
a  satirical  piece  on  politicians,  law-makers 
28 


RELATIONS    WITH   OWEN 

and  courts  of  justice  — undoubtedly  Warren's 
—  which  displays  much  native  wit.  The 
New  York  Daily  Sentinel  at  this  time  published 
an  editorial  calling  attention  to  the  new  views 
of  "an  individual  from  Cincinnati,"  which  it 
recommends  as  giving  the  only  solution  to 
social  and  labor  problems,  illustrating  the 
Principles  in  a  dialogue  in  which  the  reformer 
replies  to  some  objections. 

Owen's  previous  arrangements  delayed 
action  upon  the  scheme  which  brought  Warren 
to  New  York.  Then  Owen  was  called  away  to 
Europe  where  he  remained  several  months, 
until  the  death  of  a  near  relative  changed  all 
his  plans  for  the  future.  Warren  at  length 
grew  tired  of  waiting  for  something  to  be  done 
for  the  Principles,  and  in  the  fall  of  1830 
returned  to  Ohio. 


29 


IV 

EDUCATIONAL   EFFORTS 

J 

Living  at  Spring  Hill,  near  Massillon, 
Ohio,  was  a  band  of  four  reformers  who  con- 
ducted a  labor  school  for  boys.  On  a  former 
visit  Warren,  finding  them  believers  in  com- 
munism, had  convinced  these  men  of  the 
soundness  of  his  views,  and  they  were  waiting 
to  complete  their  contract  to  run  the  school 
three  years,  at  the  expiration  of  which  they 
were  to  join  the  Cincinnati  reformer  in  a  village 
experiment.  With  these  honest  souls  Warren 
decided  to  throw  in  his  lot  for  a  time,  and  he 
soon  began  experiments  designed  to  test  the 
feasibility  of  acquiring  trades  without  long 
apprenticeships.  He  took  lessons  himself  in 
making  wagon-wheels,  quickly  became  pro- 
ficient and  set  some  of  the  boys  to  learn  shoe- 
making  and  other  trades.  The  boys  were 
treated  according  to  the  principle  of  Equity, 
given  self-sovereignty,  allowed  to  assume 
responsibility  for  their  own  support,  and,  as 
a  consequence  of  being  thrown  upon  their  own 
30 


EDUCATIONAL   EFFORTS 

resources,  they  formed  habits  of  thinking  and 
deciding  for  themselves,  sought  advice  which 
they  received  with  gratitude  and  paid  for  by 
exchanging  their  labor  equitably  with  the  labor 
of  their  teachers ;  all  of  which  proved  a  valuable 
means  of  education  and  taught  them  more  in 
one  week,  when  all  their  interests  were  aroused 
and  their  innate  capacities  called  forth,  than 
they  would  have  learned  in  a  year  by  the  com- 
mon method  of  enforced  instruction. 

Warren's  own  children  were  in  like  manner 
trained  in  habits  of  industry  and  self-reliance. 
The  beneficial  results  of  the  working  of  his 
Principles  were  exemplified  in  a  striking  degree 
in  the  person  of  his  son  George.  At  four  years 
old  the  boy  was  taught  to  use  carpenter's  tools. 
At  seven  he  learned  type-setting  and  composed 
a  tiny  book  with  pages  one  inch  square.  From 
one  thing  to  another  he  proceeded  after  the 
manner  of  a  child,  exploring  all-fields  of  knowl- 
edge open  to  him.  He  was  a  musician,  and 
at  seventeen  began  to  teach  for  a  living.  At 
eighteen  he  built  an  organ,  fashioning  it  from 
the  raw  material.  It  was  sold  at  the  current 
31 


JOSIAH   WARREN 

price  of  such  instruments.  Being  a  practical 
wood-worker,  he  made  the  best  paling  fence 
in  the  town.  He  was  also  skilled  in  the  use 
of  pencil  and  brush,  and,  as  one  of  his  sources 
of  income,  painted  some  of  the  most  artistic 
signs  in  that  part  of  the  country.  At  nineteen 
the  young  man  was  considered  one  of  the  ablest 
orchestra  teachers  then  known  in  the  West. 
When  he  was  twenty-one  he  was  noted  as 
a  composer  of  band-music,  and  was  an  expert 
performer  on  the  Clarinet,  French  Horn, 
Trombone,  Sax  Horn,  Cornet,  Violin,  and 
'Cello.  He  learned  cabinet-making,  and  after- 
wards became  a  successful  manufacturer. 

The  following  passage  from  "  Equitable 
Commerce"  (Second  Edition,  page  50)  sum- 
marizes Warren's  views  on  the  principles  to  be 
observed  in  the  education  of  the  young.  It 
shows  how  far  ahead  of  his  generation  were 
his  ideas  on  this  as  well  as  on  other  subjects : 

"What  is  education?     What  is  the  power 

of    education?     With    whom    will    we    trust 

the  fearful  power  of  forming  the  character  and 

determining  the  destinies  of  the  future  race  ? . .  . 

32 


EDUCATIONAL   EFFORTS 

The  educating  power  is  in  whatever  surrounds 
us.  If  we  would  have  education  to  qualify 
children  for  future  life,  then  must  education 
embrace  those  practices  and  principles  which 
will  be  demanded  in  adult  life.  \  If  we  would 
have  them  practise  equity  toward  each  other, 
in  adult  life,  we  must  surround  them  with 
equitable  practices  and  treat  them  equitably. 
If  we  would  have  children  respect  the  rights  of 
property  in  others,  we  must  respect  their  rights 
of  property.  If  we  would  have  them  respect  the 
individual  peculiarities  and  the  proper  liberty 
of  others,  then  we  must  respect  their  individual 
peculiarities  and  their  personal  liberty.  If  we 
would  have  them  know  and  claim  for  themselves 
the  proper  reward  of  labor  in  adult  age,  we 
must  give  them  the  proper  reward  of  their 
labor  in  childhood. 

"If  we  would  qualify  them  to  sustain 
and  preserve  themselves  in  after  life,  they  must 
be  given  the  opportunity  in  childhood  and 
youth.  If  we  would  have  them  capable  of 
self-government  in  adult  age,  they  should 
practise  the  rights  of  self-government  in  child- 
33 


JOSIAH   WARREN 

hood.  If  we  would  have  them  learn  to  govern 
themselves  rationally,  with  a  view  to  the  conse- 
quences of  their  acts,  they  must  be  allowed  to 
govern  themselves  by  the  consequences  of  their 
acts  in  childhood.  Children  are  principally 
the  creatures  of  example.  If  we  strike  them, 
they  will  strike  each  other.  If  they  see  us 
attempting  to  govern  each  other,  they  will 
imitate  the  same  barbarism.  If  we  habitually 
admit  the  right  of  self-sovereignty  in  each 
other  and  in  them,  they  will  become  equally 
respectful  of  our  rights  and  each  other's." 


V 

VARIOUS  ACTIVITIES 

In  March,  1831,  Warren  returned  to  Cin- 
cinnati to  begin  preparations  for  the  next 
move,  an  Equity  village.  He  now  investigated 
those  branches  of  industry  which  would  be  of 
most  use  to  people  contemplating  the  building 
up  of  a  new  community.  Having  no  faith  in 
the  co-operation  of  capitalists  in  reform  move- 
ments, he  saw  that  the  work  must  be  done  by 
those  who  had  nothing  but  their  hands,  their 
time,  and  their  necessities.  But  how  were  these 
to  be  made  available  ?  To  answer  the  question, 
this  indefatigable  reformer  made  daily  practical 
experiments  in  iron  and  wood  working,  the 
construction  of  houses,  of  spinning  machinery, 
and  the  making  of  various  articles  of  indispen- 
sable necessity.  But  most  important  of  all 
were  his  efforts  to  simplify  and  cheapen  the  art 
of  printing. 

The  year  1832  was  memorable  in  Cincinnati 
as  that  of  the  cholera  epidemic.  Warren, 
though  not  trained  as  a  medical  man,  was  yet 
35 


JOSIAH   WARREN 

ready  to  perform  his  duty  as  a  social  physician, 
and  his  public  spirit  soon  found  an  outlet  in  a 
service  to  his  fellow-citizens.  His  mechanical 
facilities  were  utilized  to  print  many  thousands 
of  leaflets  containing  directions  for  fighting  the 
dread  disease.  From  the  works  of  a  Scotch 
physician,  Dr.  James  B.  Kirk,  a  recognized 
authority  on  cholera,  he  compiled  useful 
information  of  a  general  sanitary  nature  ; 
described  the  first  symptoms  of  the  disease, 
together  with  the  best  method  of  treating 
it;  and,  at  his  own  cost,  printed  the  sheets  on 
a  small  press  invented  by  himself,  and  dis- 
tributed them  throughout  the  city  which  was 
being  decimated  by  the  scourge.  This  service 
was  continued  for  several  months.  Warren's 
son,  now  Capt.  G.  W.  Warren  of  Evansville, 
Ind.,  then  a  boy  of  six  or  seven,  who  frequently 
assisted  in  these  missions,  still  remembers  the 
pleasure  it  gave  his  father  when  some  well- 
known  citizen,  meeting  him  in  the  streets 
engaged  upon  his  humane  task,  would  stop 
him,  grasp  him  warmly  by  the  hand,  and 
express  his  gratitude  for  that  philanthropic 
36 


VARIOUS  ACTIVITIES 

work.  Captain  Warren  states  that  the  city 
government  afterwards  passed  a  resolution  of 
public  thanks  to  his  father  in  recognition  of  the 
service  he  then  performed  ;  but  the  public 
records  of  the  city  have  since  been  destroyed 
by  fire  and  no  copy  of  the  resolution  can  be 
obtained. 

At  this  period  Warren  followed  music  as 
a  regular  vocation,  and  his  services  as  leader 
of  bands  were  in  considerable  request.  All 
Free  Masons  and  members  of  the  fraternal 
orders  who  succumbed  to  the  cholera  were 
accorded  public  funerals,  and  throughout 
the  period  of  the  visitation  Warren  might  have 
been  seen  almost  every  day  accompanying 
a  solemn  cortege,  at  the  head  of  a  band,  playing 
a  funeral  march.  With  this  professional  work 
and  his  labor  of  love  in  the  printing  and  distri- 
bution of  handbills,  the  reformer  was  then 
a  popular  figure  in  the  streets  of  Cincinnati. 

The  Peaceful  Revolutionist,  Warren's  first 

periodical,  appeared  in  January,  1833,  but  did 

not  survive  the  same  year.     It  was  a  four-page 

weekly  of  conspicuously  clear  and  neat  typog- 

*  37 


JOSIAH   WARRJEN 

raphy,  devoted  to  the  principles  of  Equity. 
So  primitive  at  this  time  were  his  resources, 
and  so  marvelous  his  skill  and  ingenuity,  that 
the  plates  from  which  the  paper  was  printed 
were  cast  over  the  fire  of  the  same  stove  at 
which  his  wife  cooked  the  family  meals.  The 
printing  press  he  used  was  his  own  invention, 
and  with  his  own  hands  he  made  type-moulds, 
cast  the  type  and  the  stereo-plates,  built  the 
press,  wrote  out  the  articles,  set  them  up,  and 
printed  off  the  sheets.  Was  there  ever  a  more 
self-dependent  enterprise?  What  enthusiastic 
devotion  to  an  idea,  what  determination  were 
here  displayed! 

Let  us  pause  for  a  moment  and  with 
the  eye  of  imagination  cast  a  glance  at  this 
remarkable  and  unassuming  man  as  he  lived 
seventy  years  ago.  In  a  remote  and  sparsely 
settled  region  he  supported  his  little  family  by 
his  precarious  earnings  as  a  band  musician. 
But  his  heart  was  in  the  movements  devoted 
to  the  general  good,  which  he  deemed  para- 
mount. His  talents  were  dedicated  to  the 
Cause,  his  spare  moments  occupied  upon 
38 


VARIOUS  ACTIVITIES 

inventions  designed  to  simplify  and  cheapen 
the  art  of  printing,  in  the  interest  of  the  propa- 
ganda. His  thoughts  were  not  of  personal 
advancement.  Material  interests  swayed  him 
not.  Yet  he  put  forth  no  claims  as  a  philan- 
thropist ;  no  note  of  conscious  self-sacrifice 
took  the  edge  off  his  devotion.  Impelled  to 
his  chosen  work  by  simple  love  of  his  kind, 
through  every  vicissitude  and  disappointment 
he  remained  steadfast  to  his  faith  in  the  ultimate 
regeneration  of  the  race. 

Tuscarawas  County,  Ohio,  was  selected 
as  the  place  in  which  to  commence  the  village 
of  Equity.  Land  to  the  extent  of  four  hundred 
acres  was  purchased  by  the  pioneer  and  his 
friends.  Some  half-dozen  families,  including 
the  adherents  from  Spring  Hill  already  men- 
tioned, early  in  1835  took  possession  of  the 
estate.  In  a  short  time  it  was  discovered  that 
the  locality  was  malarial,  breeding  low  fever, 
ague,  and  constant  sickness.  A  saw-mill  and 
several  houses  were,  however,  erected,  but  the 
settlers-had  not  the  temerity  to  invite  any  more 
to  join  them  while  influenza  and  malaria  were 


JOSIAH   WARREN 

undermining  their  health  and  carrying  off  the 
less  robust  of  their  members.  The  idea  of 
building  up  a  community  in  this  region  was 
abandoned,  but  having  invested  their  last 
dollar  in  land  and  buildings,  they  could  not  at 
once  get  away,  and  it  was  nearly  two  years 
before  they  were  able  to  provide  themselves 
with  homes  elsewhere.  Even  then  they  could 
leave  the  ill-starred  place  only  by  sacrificing 
nearly  all  their  labor  and  investments. 

Warren,  repulsed  but  not  defeated  in  his 
first  encounter  with  the  impercipient  elements 
and  raw  material  of  nature,  in  1837  again 
returned  to  New  Harmony,  which,  despite  the 
failure  of  communism,  had  grown  into  a 
prosperous  town. 

The  leaven  of  social  discontent  and  aspi- 
ration first  introduced  by  Robert  Owen  appears 
never  to  have  been  quite  exhausted,  and  was 
wont  to  manifest  itself  at  intervals  in  waves 
of  communistic  enthusiasm.  Ten  or  twelve 
years  later,  when  the  events  of  1825-26  at  New 
Harmony  had  been  forgotten,  co-operative  effort 
took  the  form  of  Fourierism,  active  propaganda 
40 


VARIOUS  ACTIVITIES 

was  carried  on  by  bands  of  devoted  workers, 
phalanxes  were  organized,  and  communities 
multiplied  throughout  the  land.  Horace 
Greeley  became  their  sponsor  in  the  press, 
and  Brook  Farm,  with  its  noted  participators, 
gained  for  them  a  reputation  which  has  survived 
in  American  literature.  Until  this  wave  sub- 
sided, and  the  sincere  but  mistaken  communists 
had  time  to  learn  by  experience  the  inevitable 
but  melancholy  lesson,  the  Individualist  re- 
former decided  to  remain  quiescent.  He  then 
spent  some  years  in  mechanical  pursuits,  dur- 
ing which  he  invented  the  cylinder-press. 


41 


VI 

THE  NEW  HARMONY  "TIME  STORE" 

In  1842  Warren  determined  to  make  another 
public  effort  on  behalf  of  Equitable  Commerce. 
A  store,  he  believed,  would  most  readily 
familiarize  the  people  with  his  ideas.  But  as 
soon  as  the  project  became  known  in  New 
Harmony  there  were  mutterings  and  threats 
from  certain  quarters  where  the  effects  of  an 
enterprise  conducted  on  the  Cost  principle 
were  dreaded.  For  this  reason  Warren,  having 
in  mind  his  Cincinnati  experiences  fifteen 
years  before,  began  to  deliver  lectures  upon 
the  subject  in  the  surrounding  country  and 
soon  created  among  the  people  a  strong  senti- 
ment in  favor  of  the  idea.  When  the  store  in 
New  Harmony  was  about  to  open,  an  incident 
occurred  which  shows  the  feeling  that  prevailed. 
Intelligence  was  received  by  some  of  Warren's 
adherents  outside  the  city  that  an  attempt 
would  be  made  to  prevent  by  force  the  opening 
of  the  Equity  store  ;  whereupon  five  men  at 
42 


THE    NEW    HARMONY   STORE 

once  jumped  up  and  declared  that  they  would 
shoulder  their  rifles  and  march  into  New 
Harmony  to  protect  the  enterprise  and  its 
founder.  The  danger  passed,  however,  with 
nothing  worse  than  covert  sneers,  studied 
misrepresentation,  and  petty  falsehoods  from 
some  of  the  neighboring  storekeepers.  Before 
many  days  the  store  was  so  crowded  with 
customers  that  some  had  to  wait  two  hours 
before  they  could  be  served. 

Opposition  of  an  underhand  nature  con- 
tinued, but,  as  Warren  observed :  "  It  was  not 
a  wordy  war  but  a  war  of  things  ;  everybody 
had  a  pocket,  even  the  storekeepers,  and  the 
subject  which  could  get  no  hearing  before  the 
pocket  was  touched  was  now  either  supported 
or  opposed  by  everyone  within  its  reach.  It 
was  not  necessary  to  reply  to  the  opposition  ; 
the  people  took  the  subject  into  their  own 
hands.  Although  they  did  not  pretend  to 
understand  its  whole  philosophy,  they  saw  that 
all  its  practical  workings  were  in  their  favor, 
and  its  influence  spread  rapidly  outward  and 
began  to  affect  the  prices  in  the  surrounding 
43 


JOSIAH   WARREN 

towns.  The  people  would  not  buy  at  home, 
but  came  twenty,  twenty-five,  and  even  one 
hundred  miles,  to  the  'Time  store,'  as  they 
called  it,  and  found  themselves  benefited. 
There  was  but  one  way  left  for  the  common 
stores, —  that  was,  to  come  down.  But  they 
could  not  come  down  to  the  prompt-pay  prices 
and  at  the  same  time  keep  up  their  credit 
system.  Then  down  came  the  credit  system, 
that  second  monstrous  feudalism,  by  which 
the  storekeepers  were  rapidly  getting  possession 
of  the  homesteads  of  the  people  of  the  surround- 
ing country .... 

"  Whatever  may  be  thought  of  the  hopeless- 
ness or  the  unpopularity  of  reform  movements, 
I  will  venture  to  assert  that  no  new  institution, 
political,  moral,  or  religious,  ever  assumed 
a  more  sudden  and  extensive  popularity  than 
the  Time  store  of  New  Harmony.  But  it  was 
principally  among  the  poor,  the  humble,  the 
downtrodden.  None  of  those  who  had  been 
accustomed  to  lead,  none  who  had  anything  to 
lead  with,  offered  the  least  assistance  nor  aid, 
nor  scarcely  sympathy,  though  they  did  not 
44 


THE    NEW   HARMONY   STORE 

attempt  to  deny  the  soundness  of  the  principles. 
.  . .  When  all  the  stores  in  the  surrounding 
country  had  come  down  in  their  prices  to  an 
equilibrium  with  the  Equity  store  the  custom 
naturally  flowed  back  again  to  them,  and 
the  next  step  was  to  wind  up  the  Time  store 
and  commence  a  village." 

This  experiment,  also,  lasted  about  two 
years,  being  conducted  on  principles  identical 
with  those  of  the  first  store.  Labor  notes  were 
used  as  on  the  former  occasion,  with  this  dif- 
ference,—  that  Warren  learned  when  exchang- 
ing his  labor  for  the  labor  of  others  to  appraise 
the  various  kinds  of  labor  at  different  valuations 
not  according  to  equal  time,  but  according  to 
equal  value,  measured  by  the  ultimate  cost. 
Some  time  before  the  store  was  closed,  two 
gentlemen  in  whom  the  public  had  confidence 
were  invited  by  the  reformer,  and  readily 
consented,  to  audit  the  books  covering  the 
operations  from  the  start.  They  found  a  small 
surplus,  which  was  merely  sufficient  to  cover 
the  expenses  of  winding  up.  It  is  an  interesting 
fact  that  the  best  friends  of  the  Equity  move- 
45 


JOSIAH   WARREN 

ment  were  found  to  be  those  who  made  no 
professions  of  reform.  Out  of  fifty  reform 
papers  to  which  was  sent  a  printed  account  of 
the  store  and  the  principles  underlying  it,  not 
one  vouchsafed  a  public  acknowledgment. 

When  the  New  Harmony  Equity  store  was 
closed  Warren  once  more  turned  his  mind  to 
invention.  He  produced  in  1844  an  original 
system  of  music  denominated  by  him  "  Mathe- 
matical Notation,"  designed  on  scientific  prin- 
ciples to  accomplish  in  the  representation  of 
harmonic  sounds  a  service  similar  to  that  per- 
formed by  phonography  in  the  representation 
of  the  elements  of  speech.  The  author  printed 
the  book  by  his  newly  perfected  "Universal 
Typography,"  and,  as  may  still  be  seen  in 
a  copy  preserved  in  the  library  of  the  New 
Harmony  Workingmen's  Institute,  it  was  a 
beautiful  example  of  his  stereotyping  process, 
reproducing  his  own  handwriting  in  delicate 
copperplate.  It  would  be  beside  my  purpose 
to  go  into  a  description  of  this  unique  invention 
which,  though  in  print,  was  never  really  pub- 
lished or  put  before  the  musical  world,  owing 
46 


TRE  NEW  HARMONY  STORE 
doubtless  to  the  author's  absorption  in  plans 
of  social  reform  ;  but  one  musical  authority, 
Dr.  Mason,  examined  the  new  mathematical 
notation  and  admitted  its  comprehensiveness 
and  simplicity,  believing,  however,  that  it  would 
be  a  hopeless  undertaking  to  attempt  to  super- 
sede the  universally  accepted  system. 

The  perfection  to  which  his  typographical 
inventions  were  brought  in  1845-46,  brought 
Warren  some  financial  prosperity,  and  revived 
his  desire  to  found  another  village.  The  seven 
thousand  dollars  he  obtained  by  the  sale  of  his 
stereotyping  patents  enabled  him  to  secure 
land  in  the  vicinity  of  New  Harmony  for  this 
purpose  ;  but  he  soon  had  reason  to  believe 
that  the  prospects  would  be  better  in  Ohio, 
near  Cincinnati,  where  it  was  anticipated  land 
could  be  obtained  on  favorable  terms.  One 
of  his  followers,  however,  wanted  to  open 
another  Time  store  on  the  ground  already 
secured,  and  to  this  plan  Warren  consented. 
They  set  out  together  for  Evansville  on  Jan.  25, 
1847,  to  purchase  stock  for  the  new  enterprise, 
and  found  the  roads  almost  impassable,  but 
47 


JOSIAH   WARREN 

met  many  sympathetic  friends  who  kindly 
entertained  them  while  the  discoverer  of 
Equitable  Commerce  devoted  most  of  his 
time  to  exposition  of  the  Principles.  A  teamster 
who  was  one  of  the  old  co-operators,  agreed  to 
bring  the  goods  from  Evansville  to  the  store, 
a  distance  of  twenty-five  miles.  The  roads 
were  so  bad  that  the  journey  occupied  four 
days  ;  the  wagoner  was  nearly  frozen,  and 
declared  that  if  the  goods  had  not  been  for 
the  Time  store  he  would  have  left  them  on  the 
road  and  returned  without  them.  But  when 
Warren  paid  a  higher  price  for  the  work  than 
was  first  agreed  upon,  he  not  only  gave  satisfac- 
tion to  the  teamster,  but  showed  that  the  limits 
of  contract  may  not  be  the  limits  of  equity. 

Upon  the  opening  of  this  co-operative 
store  on  May  18,  1847,  the  reformer  planned 
and  successfully  held  a  social  reunion  to  which 
were  invited  the  people  of  the  surrounding 
country,  to  celebrate  the  opening,  twenty  years 
before,  of  the  first  Time  store  in  Cincinnati. 
The  new  store  was  conducted  by  the  person 
whom  Warren  had  assisted  to  open  it,  whilst 
48 


THE    NEW    HARMONY    STORE 

the  latter  departed  for  new  fields  of  labor  that 
claimed  his  attention.  No  account  remains 
of  the  subsequent  course  of  this  undertaking. 

It  was  not  until  1846,  after  twenty  years' 
study  and  experience,  that  Warren  put  forth 
the  fruits  of  his  thought  and  labor  in  a  book, 
published  by  the  author  under  the  title  of 
"Equitable  Commerce."  Although  the  date 
of  publication  is  given  in  his  later  writings  as 
1846,  Warren's  first  reference  to  the  work  is 
found  in  a  letter  he  wrote  from  New  Har- 
mony, dated  April  25,  1847,  wherein  he  speaks 
of  it  as  being  "out  at  last."  A  second  edition 
was  printed  in  1849  at  Utopia,  Ohio,  and  Fowler 
and  Wells  of  New  York  in  1852  issued  another 
edition  which  they  followed  with  Warren's 
"Practical  Details  of  Equitable  Commerce," 
. .  .these  works  and  the  author's  subsequent 
writings  being  usually  referred  to  under  the 
general  title,  "True  Civilization,"  all  of  which 
are  now  out  of  print.  After  Warren's  death, 
Benj.  R.  Tucker  in  1875  at  Princeton,  Mass., 
reprinted  a  small  edition  of  "  Equitable  Com- 
merce." This  also  has  long  been  out  of  print. 
49 


VII 

THE  VILLAGE   OF   UTOPIA 

To  describe  the  next  event  in  Warren's 
career  we  must  return  to  1844,  when  the  Clare- 
mount  Phalanx,  a  Fourier  association,  was 
about  to  be  organized  in  Cincinnati.  The 
founder  of  Equity  delivered  an  address  to  the 
projectors  in  which  he  warned  them  that  their 
communistic  enterprise  would  certainly  fail, 
giving  them  three  years  in  which  to  discover 
the  error  of  their  principles.  He  begged  them 
to  remember,  when  his  warning  should  come 
true,  that,  despite  the  failure  of  their  attempt, 
there  was  yet  a  road  to  success.  At  the  same 
time  he  gave  an  outline  of  the  principles  and 
methods  of  Equity.  Just  two  years  and  eight 
months  later  he  learned  that  the  community, 
after  a  hand-to-hand  scramble  for  some  of  the 
"common  property,"  had  broken  up.  Then 
he  concluded  the  time  had  come  to  interest 
them  in  his  ideas,  and  in  June,  1847,  he  landed 
from  a  steamboat  where  the  community  was 
located  on  the  banks  of  the  Ohio  River,  thirty 
50 


THE    VILLAGE    OF    UTOPIA 

miles  from  Cincinnati,  and  was  met  by  one 
Daniel  Prescott,  who  said,  "Well,  we  have 
failed  just  as  you  foretold  ;  it  worked  exactly 
as  you  said  it  would,  and  if  you  had  been 
a  prophet  you  could  not  have  told  more  accu- 
rately what  would  happen.  Now  I  am  ready 
for  your  method." 

Warren  found  six  families  almost  destitute. 
Homes  must  be  erected  and  land  secured. 
About  a  mile  above  Claremount  there  was 
some  land  owned  by  Mr.  Jernegan,  a  believer 
in  Equitable  Commerce,  with  whom  an  arrange- 
ment was  made  to  lay  out  the  estate  in  quarter- 
acre  lots.  The  price  was  determined  on  the 
Cost  Principle.  To  the  value  of  the  land  by 
the  acre  was  added  the  cost  of  laying  out  streets, 
of  surveying,  etc.,  and  of  the  time  spent  on 
the  work  by  the  proprietor,  who  agreed  in 
writing  to  keep  unchanged  the  original  price 
upon  all  unsold  lots  for  three  years.  It  was 
afterwards  discovered  by  the  pioneers  that  three 
years  were  too  short  a  time  to  be  insured  against 
a  speculative  rise  in  land  values.  Warren 
considered  a  uniform  price  for  ten  years  at 
51 


JOSIAH   WARREN 

least  to  be  necessary  for  the  successful  building 
up  of  a  community. 

It  should  be  remembered  that  all  Warren's 
attempts  in  this  direction  were  made  with  those 
whose  only  means  was  their  labor  force,  and 
his  purpose  was  to  demonstrate  that  such 
people,  with  free  access  to  natural  resources, 
could,  by  exchanging  their  labor  on  equitable 
terms  through  the  use  of  labor  notes,  build 
their  own  houses,  supply  their  prime  necessities, 
and  attain  to  comfort  and  prosperity  without 
dependence  on  capitalists  or  on  any  external 
authority  for  the  means  of  life.  "  I  would  not," 
said  Warren,  "urge  the  capitalist  to  use  his 
capital  in  our  cause."  To  do  so  he  regarded 
as  a  waste  of  time,  and  he  preferred  to  use  his 
efforts  to  show  the  victims  of  capital  how  they 
could  escape  from  its  tyranny.  If  he  succeeded 
in  this,  he  declared,  capital  would  be  powerless, 
and  "  its  holders  the  dependents. " 

When  they  began  on  the  new  plan  in  the 
middle  of  July,  there  was  not  ten  dollars  in 
possession  of  all  the  settlers  ;  but  by  the  follow- 
ing December  most  of  the  families  had  good 
52 


THE   VILLAGE   OF   UTOPIA 

houses,  some  being  built  of  brick  two  stories 
high,  nearly  or  wholly  paid  for.  The  village 
consisted  of  eighty  quarter-acre  lots,  and  as 
the  surrounding  land  was  controlled  by  specu- 
lators, there  was  no  room  for  expansion. 
Within  three  years  a  steam  saw-and-grist-mill 
was  running,  its  owner  having  the  assistance 
of  all  the  residents  because  he  furnished  lum- 
ber at  cost  and  thus  rendered  it  to  their  advan- 
tage to  co-operate  with  the  mill.  But  this  mode 
of  co-operation  left  everyone  connected  with 
the  enterprise  free  from  obligations,  pledges, 
or  involved  interests. 

Here  is  an  extract  from  Warren's  notes 
written  at  this  period  in  Utopia,  as  the  village 
was  named.  "The  owner  of  the  mill  issued 
his  labor  notes  payable  in  lumber.  H.  B.  Lyon 
paid  for  his  lot  with  his  labor  notes.  The  mill 
needed  his  labor  and  the  owner  of  the  mill 
needed  lumber.  Mr.  Lyon  issued  his  notes 
promising  his  labor  in  the  mill  —  the  owner  of 
the  mill  took  them  of  the  landowner  for  lumber, 
and  Mr.  Lyon  redeemed  them  in  tending  the 
mill.  With  all  my  hopes  I  had  not  dared  to 
53 


JOSIAH   WARREN 

expect  to  see  land  bought  with  labor  notes 
so  soon  as  this." 

In  an  article  published  in  1848,  Warren 
describes  the  conditions  which  then  prevailed 
at  Utopia,  and  after  showing  how  the  people 
got  along  without  rules  or  organizations,  not 
even  having  a  single  public  lecture  to  expound 
their  principles,  he  says : 

"  I  do  not  mean  to  be  understood  that  all 
are  of  one  mind.  On  the  contrary,  in  a  pro- 
gressive state  there  is  no  demand  for  con- 
formity. We  build  on  Individuality.  Any 
differences  between  us  confirm  our  position. 
Differences,  therefore,  like  the  admissible  dis- 
cords in  music,  are  a  valuable  part  of  our 
harmony.  It  is  only  when  the  rights  of  per- 
sons or  property  are  actually  invaded  that 
collisions  arise.  These  rights  being  clearly 
defined  and  sanctioned  by  public  opinion,  and 
temptations  to  encroachments  being  withdrawn, 
we  may  then  consider  our  great  problem  prac- 
tically solved.  With  regard  to  mere  difference 
of  opinion  in  taste,  convenience,  economy, 
equality,  or  even  right  and  wrong,  good  and 
54 


THE   VILLAGE   OF   UTOPIA 

bad,  sanity  and  insanity, — all  must  be  left  to 
the  supreme  decision  of  each  individual,  when- 
ever he  can  take  on  himself  the  cost  of  his 
decisions;  which  he  cannot  do  while  his  inter- 
ests or  movements  are  united  or  combined 
with  others.  It  is  in  combination  or  close 
connection  only  that  compromise  or  con- 
formity is  required.  Peace,  harmony,  ease,  i 

security,  happiness,  will  be  found  only  in  Indi-  f 

.,     ,.,    „ 
viduality.  . 

Mr.  E.  G.  Cubberley,  one  of  the  first  settlers, 
in  October,  1872,  while  still  residing  in  his 
original  house  at  Utopia,  wrote:  "The  labor 
notes  put  us  into  a  reciprocating  society  —  the 
result  was,  in  two  years  twelve  families  found 
themselves  with  homes  who  never  owned  them 
before ....  Labor  capital  did  it.  I  built  a  brick 
cottage  one  and  a  half  stories  high,  and  all  the 
money  I  paid  out  was  $9.81  — all  the  rest  was 
effected  by  exchanging  labor  for  labor.  Mr. 
Warren  is  right,  and  the  way  to  get  back  as  ' 
much  labor  as  we  give  is  by  the  labor-cost 
prices, —  money  prices,  with  no  principle  to 
guide,  have  always  deceived  us." 
55 


JOSIAH   WARREN 

It  may  naturally  be  asked,  What  became 
of  the  village  ?  Why  did  Equity  villages  not 
multiply?  Why  did  the  pioneers  keep  from 
the  public  as  far  as  possible  all  information 
concerning  them?  To  such  questions  no 
satisfactory  answer  in  a  few  words  can  be  given. 
Owing  to  the  high  price  of  the  surrounding 
land  most  of  the  settlers  after  about  four  years 
moved  from  Utopia  into  Minnesota,  where  land 
was  cheap  and  abundant. 


56 


VIII 

MODERN   TIMES 

Leaving  the  scenes  of  his  labors  in  Ohio  and 
Indiana,  Warren,  in  1850,  took  up  his  abode 
in  New  York  City,  where  he  formed  an  intimacy 
with  the  philosophical  writer  and  reformer, 
Stephen  Pearl  Andrews.  From  this  time  forth 
Andrews  became  the  literary  exponent  of  the 
philosophy  of  Equity.  He  delivered  in  1851  a 
course  of  lectures  on  "The  Science  of  Society," 
embracing  an  exposition  of  the  Sovereignty 
of  the  Individual,  and  Cost  the  Limit  of  Price.* 
Andrews'  "Science  of  Society,"  containing  a 
scholarly  essay  on  government,  has  probably 
done  more  toward  calling  the  attention  of 
independent  thinkers  and  reformers  to  Warren's 
philosophy  than  anything  ever  put  forth  by 
himself,  and  is  by  far  the  ablest  statement  of 
the  Principles  which  has  yet  appeared. 

It  was  but  a  short  time  after  Warren  came 
to  New  York  that  earnest  people  in  that  city, 
in  Boston,  and  elsewhere  began  to  evince  much 

*The*e  lectures,  published  in  book  form  may  still  be  obtained 
from  Benjamin  R.  Tucker,  the  Editor  of  "Liberty,"  New  York. 

57 


JOSIAH   WARREN 

interest    in    the    individualistic    form    of    co- 
operation advocated  by  him. 

Warren,  though  never  assuming  to  be 
a  public  speaker,  developed  his  conversational 
gifts  to  such  a  degree  that  his  "Parlor  Con- 
versations" became  noted  in  reform  circles,  and 
proved  a  valuable  means  of  disseminating  his 
ideas.  At  these  informal  meetings  it  was  his 
custom  to  introduce  the  topic  for  the  occasion  — 
always  expository  of  his  distinctive  opinions  — 
in  a  brief  talk,  after  which  he  invited  questions 
from  the  audience,  that  usually  were  forth- 
coming with  a  readiness  and  spirit  evincing 
a  warm  interest  in  the  subject.  In  his  replies 
the  reformer  invariably  proved  himself  quick, 
witty,  and  convincing  ;  but  he  never  allowed 
himself  to  be  drawn  into  wordy  disputation, 
deeming  it  a  waste  of  time  to  engage  with 
opponents  in  fruitless  argument.  It  was  at 
one  of  the  "Conversations"  held  in  New  York 
that  Stephen  Pearl  Andrews,  then  an  enthusi- 
astic Fourierist,  was  converted  to  the  principles 
of  Equity.  Many  years  later  another  able 
writer  and  determined  opponent,  C.  T.  Fowler, 
58 


MODERN    TIMES 

was  won  over  to  Warren's  ideas  by  the  light 
thrown  upon  social  problems  at  one  of  these 
gatherings  in  Boston.  This  method  of  propa- 
ganda was  utilized  almost  to  the  end  of  his  life 
wherever  he  happened  to  sojourn  and  could 
find  appreciative  listeners. 

A  spot  on  Long  Island,  forty  miles  from 
New  York  by  the  Long  Island  Railroad  was 
selected  for  another  experiment.  The  soil  was 
considered  worthless,  and  several  attempts  by 
capitalists  to  turn  it  to  account  had  failed. 
But  this  seemed  no  deterrent  to  those  imbued 
with  the  principles  of  Equity.  There  was  no 
lumber  on  the  land  save  scrub-oak,  even  for 
fuel,  but  it  was  thought  that  the  soil  might  be 
adapted  to  market-gardening,  while  manu- 
factures could  be  introduced  to  furnish  em- 
ployment. "One  man,"  says  Warren,  "went 
to  the  ground  alone  and  built  a  shanty  ten  or 
twelve  feet  square  where  there  was  not  so  much 
as  a  cow-path  in  sight.  He  was  joined  in 
a  few  days  by  two  others,  and  they  built  the 
first  house  with  funds  supplied  by  a  sympa- 
thizing friend.  More  pioneers  arrived,  and 
59 


JOSIAH   WARREN 

soon  the  houses  went  up,  apparently  without 
means,  and  many  now  possessed  houses  who 
had  never  owned  one  before."  Thus  matters 
progressed  until  someone  published  in  the 
New  York  Tribune  an  account  of  the  colony, 
which  the  projectors  had  named  Modern  Times. 
This  undesired  publicity  quickly  brought  many 
people,  mostly  ignorant  of  the  ideas  on  which 
the  village  was  founded.  True  to  the  principle 

|  of  Individual  Sovereignty,  or  non-interference, 
which  gives  equal  rights  to  all  in  natural 
opportunities,  the  pioneers  refrained  from 
taking  any  steps  toward  excluding  the  new- 
comers, so  long  as  they  did  not  invade  the 

•  rights  of  others. 

This  freedom  was  not  at  first  without  its 
drawbacks,  though  in  the  end  it  invariably 
proved  a  self-corrective.  Again  to  quote 
Warren :  "  One  man  began  to  advocate  plurality 
of  wives,  and  published  a  paper  to  support  his 
views  ;  another  believed  clothing  to  be  a  super- 
fluity, and  not  only  attempted  to  practise  his 
Adamic  theories  in  person,  but  inflicted  his 
views  upon  his  hapless  children.  A  woman 
60 


MODERN   TIMES 

with  an  ungainly  form  displayed  herself  in 
public  in  men's  attire,  which  gave  rise  to  the 
newspaper  comment  that  '  the  women  of  Mod- 
ern Times  dressed  in  men's  clothes  and  looked 
hideous.'  Still  another  young  woman  had 
the  diet  mania  so  severely  that  after  trying  to 
live  on  beans  without  salt  until  reduced  almost 
to  a  skeleton  she  died  within  a  year."  Where- 
upon the  newspapers  cried,  "The  people  of 
Modern  Times  are  killing  themselves  with 
fanatical  ideas  about  food."  These  were  some 
of  the  burdens  the  real  settlers  had  to  bear 
because  they  respected  the  rights  of  others,  and 
accorded  liberty  to  do  even  the  silliest  things, 
knowing  that  experience,  and  the  principle 
which  allows  such  things  to  be  done  at  each 
one's  own  cost,  would  work  the  best  and  surest 
cure. 

A  reporter,  in  the  course  of  an  interview 
with  one  of  the  residents,  asked,  "  Do  you  hold 
to  Marriage?"  "Marriage!  Well,  folks  ask 
no  questions  in  regard  to  that  among  us. 
We,  or  at  least  some  of  us,  do  not  believe  in 
life  partnerships  when  the  parties  cannot  live 
61 


JOSIAH   WARREN 

happily.     Every  person  here  is  supposed  to 

know  his  or  her  own  interest  best.     We  don't 

interfere  ;  there  is  no  eavesdropping  or  prying 

behind  the  curtain.     Those  are  good  members 

of  society  who  are  industrious  and  mind  their 

own  business.     The  individual  is  sovereign  and 

:  independent,  and  all  laws  tending  to  restrict 

I  the  liberty  he  or  she  should  enjoy  are  founded 

on  error  and  should  not  be  regarded." 

Among  the  strangers  who  came  to  live  in 
Modern  Times  was  a  slanderer,  who  com- 
mitted innumerable  ridiculous  acts,  abused 
the  leading  spirits,  made  himself  generally 
obnoxious,  and  finally  wrote  a  long  description 
including  the  very  doings  he  himself  had 
perpetrated,  which  was  published  as  a  picture 
of  the  villagers.  Such  misrepresentations  often 
found  their  way  across  the  Atlantic,  and 
greatly  chagrined  Warren,  who  had  numerous 
sympathizers  in  England.  A  minister  of  the 
gospel  from  Cincinnati  visited  the  Colony  to 
investigate,  and  was  courteously  treated.  He 
returned  home,  and  published  in  the  Gazette 
a  virulent  attack  upon  the  inhabitants  of 
62 


MODERN   TIMES 

Modern  Times.  Of  twenty-six  statements 
therein  purporting  to  be  facts,  Warren  declared 
that  "twenty-five  were  wholly  or  partly  false 
and  one  was  equivocal."  Nevertheless  the 
pioneers  of  Equity  prospered,  and  after  reaping 
so  much  of  the  undesirable  fruits  of  notoriety, 
decided  to  change  the  name  of  the  place  to 
Brentwood,  the  name  it  still  bears.  More 
than  this,  they  often  let  the  statement  go 
forth  that  the  experiment  had  come  to  an  end 
in  order  to  escape  the  interminable  annoyance 
of  sensational  press  reports  and  equally  ob- 
noxious visiting  cranks. 

Free  from  the  illusions  of  mere  enthusiasts, 
Warren  and  his  disciples  differed  from  other 
schools  of  reformers  in  accepting  the  world  as  it 
really  is.  They  did  not  expect  their  villages, 
even  if  these  became  numerous,  to  solve  the 
social  problem,  nor  did  they  ever  consider 
them  as  anything  but  an  illustration  of  what 
might  be  done  by  labor,  freed  from  the  curse  of 
monopoly  and  the  blight  of  authority,  through 
the  practice  of  Equity,  toward  building  up 
a  self-dependent,  prosperous,  and  happy  com- 
63 


JOSIAH   WARREN 

munity.  To  secure  the  welfare  of  a  handful 
of  isolated  individuals  was  never  the  ultimate 
aim  they  had  in  view,  but  to  show,  in  a  quiet, 
practical,  non-invasive  way  that  equity  and 
justice  in  human  relations  would  promote 
happiness  to  a  degree  unattainable  in  the  pres- 
ent selfish  scramble  for  place  and  power. 

The  spirit  of  the  movement  may  be  gleaned 
from  letters  written  "by  residents  of  Modern 
Times  after  it  had  been  several  years  in  exist- 
ence. Only  a  few  brief  extracts  can  here  be 
given.  Under  date  of  Aug.  22,  1857,  Edward 
D.  Linton,  writing  to  his  English  friend, 
A.  C.  Cuddon,  says: 

"For  more  than  twenty  years  I  have  been 
interested  in  the  subject  of  societary  reform  ; 
I  have  examined  many  if  not  all  the  theories 
that  have  been  put  forth  at  various  periods  in 
the  history  of  mankind ....  My  mind  was  thus 
occupied  when,  more  than  ten  years  ago,  I 
heard  the  principles  enunciated  from  Mr. 
Warren's  own  lips ....  The  more  I  study  and 
examine  them,  the  severer  the  tests  I  apply, 
and  the  more  practically  I  apply  them,  the 
64 


MODERN    TIMES 

more  certain  am  I  that  they  constitute  the  grand 
and  fundamental  laws  of  individual  rights 
and  social  life ....  But  the  practical  realization 
of  the  principles  will  be  a  thing  of  growth. 
They  cannot  be  instituted,  inaugurated,  by 
any  means  or  appliances  under  heaven .... 
Any  attempt  at  their  realization,  in  any  of  the 
hitherto  popular  modes  of  reform,  will  fail .... 
"You  have  been  here,  Sir,  and  I  ask  you, 
considering  the  natural  obstacles  to  overcome, 
if  you  ever  saw  greater  material  success  attained 
in  so  short  a  time,  by  the  same  number  of 
people  without  capital,  and  with  only  their 
hands  and  brains  to  operate  with,  under  all 
the  disadvantages  of  habits  formed  by  a  false 
education  and  training. . .  .  And  as  it  regards 
individual  and  social  happiness  and  the  entire 
absence  of  vice  and  crime,  I  am  confident  this 
settlement  cannot  be  equalled.  This  is,  em- 
phatically, the  school  of  life.  It  is  what  has 
been  learned  here,  infinitely  more  than  what 
has  been  done  that  constitutes  what  I  consider 
the  great  success  of  the  settlement.  What  has 
not  been  done  is,  I  think,  of  far  more  con- 
65 


JOSIAH  WARREN 
sequence  than  what  has  been  done ....  I 
would  rather  that  my  children  (six  in  number) 
would  live  here  and  have  the  advantages  of 
the  society  and  the  practical  lessons  taught 
here  than  for  them  to  have  what  is  called  an 
education  in  the  best  institution  of  learning 
in  the  world. . . . 

"  But  whether  I  ever  live  to  see  the  practical 
realization  of  the  principles  or  not,  here  or 
elsewhere,  I  can  never  feel  sufficiently  grateful 
to  the  unostentatious  man  whose  remarkable 
and  peculiar  constitution  of  mind  enabled  him 
to  discover  the  most  subtle  and  sublime  truths 
ever  made  known  to  man  for  his  self-govern- 
ment and  the  regulation  of  his  intercourse  with 
his  neighbor.  In  my  own  person  and  in  my 
own  domestic  affairs  I  have  been  incalculably 
benefited." 

The  following  year  Mr.  A.  C.  Cuddon  of 
London  paid  another  visit  to  Modern  Times 
about  which  he  writes  from  Long  Island,  July, 
1858 :  "  They  (the  principles)  are  comprehensive 
and  of  universal  application.  They  cover  the 
whole  ground  of  social  economy,  extending  into 
66 


MODERN   TIMES 

all  the  ramifications  of  life  and  penetrating 
into  every  particular  case ....  They  are  not 
a  mere  speculation  or  preconceived  theory. 
They  are  the  fruit  of  extensive  and  long- 
continued  research  conducted  upon  principles 
rigidly  scientific,  moral,  and  religious.  If  true, 
and  I  challenge  the  closest  scrutiny  and  severest 
criticism,  they  create  a  new  era  in  social  science. 
The  arguments  which  support  them  are  neither 
difficult  nor  subtle  ;  the  facts  on  which  they 
rest  are  numerous,  plain,  and  accessible  ;  they 
are  very  simple  conclusions  from  very  simple 
evidence.  If  they  to  some  appear  startling 
when  confronted  with  existing  opinions,  it  is 
only  because  they  introduce  real  science  with 
all  its  acquirements  into  a  branch  of  knowledge 
generally  abandoned  to  speculative  reasoning 
or  unsuspecting  credulity." 

Broad  avenues,  tree-shaded  streets,  pretty 
cottages  surrounded  by  strawberry-beds  and 
well-tilled  gardens,  formed  the  outward  ap- 
pearance of  Modern  Times.  The  occupants 
were  honest,  industrious,  and  had  learned  to 
mind  their  own  business,  while  readily  co- 
67 


JOSIAH   WARREN 

operating  with  their  neighbors  for  mutual 
advantage.  They  were  free  from  sectarian 
dissensions,  courts  of  law,  policemen,  jails, 
rum-shops,  prostitutes,  and  crime.  No  one 
acquired  wealth  save  by  his  own  industry. 
Long  afterwards,  the  people  who  lived  there 
during  the  years  that  the  principles  of  Equity 
were  the  only  law  looked  back  with  regret 
mingled  with  pleasure  on  those  pioneer  days 
of  effort  to  achieve  a  higher  social  ideal. 

Moncure  D.  Conway  visited  Modern  Times 
about  1858  and  wrote  a  description  of  what  he 
heard  and  saw  of  the  village  and  its  inhabitants, 
which  was  published  in  the  Fortnightly  Review, 
No.  4,  July  1,  1865.  The  article  may  be 
consulted  in  Vol.  I.,  p.  421,  but  contains  many 
statements,  evidently  hearsay,  concerning  the 
early  history  of  the  Equity  movement  and  its 
founder  that  are  by  no  means  reliable.  There 
is  no  reason,  however,  to  impugn  the  trust- 
worthyness  of  a  writer  so  painstaking  and 
scholarly  as  Conway  when  giving  the  results 
of  his  personal  observation  on  the  spot.  His 
impressions  were  favorable,  and  he  carried 
68 


MODERN    TIMES 

back  with  him  into  the  world  a  lasting  sympathy 
with  the  pioneers  and  their  aims. 

"Not  being  sure  whether  a  place  where 
people  attended  to  their  own  affairs  and  did 
without  money  was  to  be  reached  by  railroad 
or  rainbow,"  he  felt  not  a  little  trepidation 
when  the  train  set  him  down  at  "Thompson's," 
about  a  mile  from  Modern  Times.  Having 
received  a  cordial  welcome  when  the  object 
of  his  visit  became  known,  he  was  introduced  to 
Warren,  whom  he  thus  describes:  "There 
entered  presently  a  man  to  whom  all  showed 
a  profound  respect,  and  who  was  introduced 
as  the  reformer,  to  embody  whose  ideas  the 
village  had  been  established.  He  was  a  short, 
thick-set  man  about  fifty  years  of  age,  with 
a  bright,  restless  blue  eye,  and  somewhat 
restless,  too,  in  his  movements.  His  forehead 
was  large,  descending  to  a  good  full  brow  ;  his 
lower  face,  especially  the  mouth,  was  not  of 
equal  strength,  but  indicated  a  mild  enthusiasm. 
He  was  fluent,  eager,  and  entirely  absorbed  in 
his  social  ideas.  It  was  pleasant  to  listen  to 
him,  for  he  was  by  no  means  one  of  those 


JOSIAH   WARREN 

reformers  who,  having  fought  with  the  world, 
hate  it  with  genuine  philanthropic  animosity, 
but  one  who  had  never  been  of  the  world  at  all, 
had  never  been  stirred  by  its  aims  nor  moved 
by  its  fears, —  one  who  was  not  deluged  with 
negations,  but  amused  with  a  troop  of  novel 
thoughts  and  fancies,  which  to  him  were  con- 
trolling convictions. 

"'Every  man,'  said  Goethe,  'is  strong 
enough  to  enforce  his  own  convictions,'  and 
the  assertion  had  for  me  a  curious  illustration 
in  the  ability  with  which  this  man  impressed 
me  with  the  sense  of  an  essential  truth  in  his 
ideas  and  plans  for  superseding  the  institutions 
which  have  evolved  in  the  slow  ages  of  history." 

The  villagers  and  their  habits  came  under 
this  writer's  observation.  "No  two  persons 
were  expected  to  dress  alike,  think  alike,  or  act 
alike  ;  nothing  was  in  such  disrepute  as  same- 
ness, nothing  more  applauded  than  variety,  no 
fault  more  venial  than  eccentricity. . . . 

"The  arrangements  of  marriage  were  of 
course  left  entirely  to  the  men  and  women 
themselves.  They  could  be  married  formally 
70 


MODERN  TIMES 

or  otherwise,  live  in  the  same  or  separate  houses, 
and  have  their  relations  known  or  unknown 
to  the  rest  of  the  village.  The  relation  could  be 
dissolved  at  pleasure  without  any  formulas .... 
"The  next  day  was  Sunday,  and  in  the 
early  morning  I  walked  through  and  around 
the  village.  It  consisted  of  less  than  one 
hundred  cottages,  which,  though  built  on  what 
we  sometimes  call  in  America  'impecunious' 
principles,  were  neat  and  clean  in  their  green 
and  white  under  the  bright  summer  morning  ; 
and  nearly  all  had  gardens  with  a  few  vegetable 
beds  and  more  flowers.  The  chief  lack  was 
of  trees  [supplied  in  due  time  by  the  villagers], 
few  or  none  being  in  that  region  ;  but  the  fields 
were  afire  with  the  barberry  and  sumach, — 
those  burning  bushes  whose  beauty  is  never 
consumed.  In  the  various  gardens  men, 
women,  and  children  were  walking,  and  some 
of  them  working, —  digging  and  watering 
plants, —  so  that  I  began  to  question  whether 
they  had  any  Sunday  in  Modern  Times.  An 
invitation,  however,  to  go  to  church  soon 
settled  that  question.  The  building  in  which 
71 


JOSIAH   WARREN 

this  meeting  was  held  was,  I  was  told,  used  for 
every  kind  of  gathering.  It  was  a  plain  room, 
with  a  stage,  and  served  for  religious  lectures, 
discussions,  theatricals,  concerts,  and  indeed 
whatever  meetings  the  villagers  needed  for  use 
or  amusement.  I  was  assured,  too,  that 
Modern  Times  was  not  without  good  actors, 
dancers,  and  singers.  I  can  bear  witness  that 
it  is  not  without  an  able  preacher  of  Positivism 
—  one  who  has  studied  the  philosophy  of 
Comte  more  thoroughly  and  can  state  it  more 
clearly  than  any  man  in  America .... 

"But  more  interesting  than  any  sermon 
were  the  Modern-Timers  themselves,  and 
especially  the  ladies  and  their  clothes.  The 
men  showed,  I  regret  to  say,  a  poverty  of 
invention  under  the  principle  that  each  should 
obey  his  or  her  fancy,  absolutely,  in  the  matter 
of  dress  ;  but  with  the  other  sex  it  had  been 
as  the  breath  of  a  tropic  for  the  varieties  of 
plumage  produced.  As  they  came  streaming 
into  the  church  they  seemed  at  first  like  a  party 
of  masqueraders  ;  but  a  close  examination  led 
me  to  the  conclusion  that  the  majority  of  the 
72 


MODERN  TIMES 
costumes  were  such  as  women  might  very  fairly 
assume  in  a  society  disembarrassed  of  con- 
ventionalities. The  idea  of  expressing  in- 
dividual taste  in  dress  was  fairly  carried  out  ; 
and  what  the  real  female  verdict  upon  the 
ordinary  dress  of  the  sex  in  the  world  is,  may 
be  inferred  from  the  fact  that  only  two  or  three 
of  them  had  dresses  at  all  resembling  the 
common  one.  The  most  usual  dress  at  Modern 
Times  was  that  which  one  sees  worn  by  stage 
peasants,  the  variations  being  in  color  and  in 
the  length  of  skirt,  which  ranged  through 
nearly  every  degree  between  the  knee  and  the 
ankle.  Of  long  or  trailing  skirts  there  were 
none.  Of  'Bloomers'  there  were  only  a  few, 
and  these  had  Turkish  trousers  instead  of  plain 
pantaloons.  The  short  skirt  and  plain  white 
stockings  predominated.  Nearly  all  wore  hats 
with  wide  brims.  There  were  few  decorations, 
and  the  colors  and  shades  worn  indicated 
a  certain  degree  of  taste  among  these  ladies." 

Conway  was  invited  in  the  afternoon  to  a 
gathering  of  neighbors  at  the  house  of  a  lady 
physician,  to  whose  intellectual  gifts  he  pays 
73 


JOSIAH  WARREN 
a  high  tribute.  "But  though  looking  around 
upon  the  faces  of  those  who  were  present  at 
the  conversazione  I  saw  many  traces  of  the 
several  storms  which  they  had  encountered, 
there  was  a  serenity  in  them  which  one  can 
rarely  see  in  those  restless  eyes  and  compressed 
lips  to  be  met  with  by  the  thousand  on  Broad- 
way. There  was,  too,  an  easy,  cordial  relation 
of  one  with  another,  a  frankness  and  simplicity 
of  intercourse,  which  gave  assurance  that  they 
were  held  together  by  a  genuine  attraction 
and  sustained  by  mutual  sympathy." 

In  this  essay  is  given  a  report  of  the  conver- 
sation that  took  place  at  the  gathering  just 
mentioned.  The  aims  and  opinions  of  the 
villagers,  showing  remarkable  clearness  of 
understanding  and  directness  of  expression, 
are  freely  transcribed.  The  deeper  problems 
of  ethical  and  social  life  were  taken  up,  each 
alking  mainly  upon  the  phase  in  which  he  or 
tshe  was  most  interested.  The  views  of  each 
were  "  given  with  the  utmost  simplicity,  without 
any  straining  after  effect  or  novelty,  and  in 
many  cases  with  an  almost  devout  earnestness.'' 
74 


MODERN  TIMES 
"  Late  in  the  evening  a  pleasant  little 
company  gathered  in  the  porch  of  the  house 
in  which  I  was  staying,  where  there  was  much 
informal  conversation,  and  also  singing  by 
various  gentlemen  and  ladies.  Under  the  touch 
of  the  moonlight  they  and  their  picturesque 
costumes  and  hymns  seemed  almost  phantas- 
mal, and  one  had  to  rub  one's  eyes  to  know  if 
one  were  not  in  some  realm  of  illusion.  Thus 
ended  my  visit  to  Modern  Times.  In  the 
morning,  when  I  caught  the  first  glimpse  of 
the  spires  of  New  York,  flame-tipped  under 
the  sunrise,  I  wondered  if  all  of  them  together 
symbolized  as  much  true  aspiration  and  purity 
in  those  who  raised  them  and  yesterday  wor- 
shiped in  them  as  were  animating  that  little 
town  of  whose  existence  the  vast  city  roared 
on  in  utter  unconsciousness."  * 

The  history  of  every  attempt  hitherto  made 
to  elevate  humanity  by  new  communities  com- 
posed of  enthusiasts  who  believe  that  they 


*A  condensed  version  of  this  visit  and  a  short  but  inaccurate 
account  of  Warren's  career  appear  in  Moncnre  D.  Conway'i 
"Autobiography,"  Boston,  1904  (Vol.  I.  pp.  264,  268). 

75 


JOSIAH  WARREN 
know  how  to  reconstruct  society  is  invariably 
the  record  of  what  the  world  calls  a  failure. 
But  the  failure  is  only  relative.  They  never 
accomplish  the  impossible  aims  with  which 
they  set  out,  and  it  is  only  of  the  impossible  or 
visionary  part  of  such  efforts  that  the  world 
learns  anything  ;  the  real  things  that  are  accom- 
plished, the  practical  and  often  invaluable 
results  that  are  in  nearly  every  case  attained, 
are  known  only  to  the  few  individuals  con- 
cerned. It  is  through  the  personal  gain  to 
these  individuals,  not  merely  in  observing  the 
results  of  human  frailty,  but  especially  in  rich 
experiences  of  sympathy  and  mutual  helpful- 
ness, that  society  is  benefited  by  such  social 
experiments.  The  only  right  and  scientific 
attitude  toward  them  is  the  receptive  and 
sympathetic.  Investigation  and  experiment^ 
are  not  only  permissible  but  indispensable  in  all 
other  fields  of  human  knowledge  and  activity. 
Why  are  they  not  equally  laudable  and  essential 
in  social  science?  We  require  data,  actual/' 
first-hand  knowledge.  And  this  seems  to 
demand  not  only  enthusiasm,  but  a  measure 
76 


MODERN   TIMES 

of  unworldliness  and  faith  born  of  ideals  which 
some  look  upon  as  mere  illusions.  Yet  such 
illusions  are  stimulating  to  pioneers  in  experi- 
mental sociology. 

To  find  the  specific  causes  of  the  failure 
of  Warren's  Equity  villages  to  form  permanent 
examples  of  society  conducted  on  right  prin- 
ciples is  no  difficult  task.  It  should  be  under- 
stood that  they  did  not  fail  in  the  sense  that 
New  Harmony,  Brook  Farm,  and  numerous 
other  socialistic  experiments  failed.  The 
pioneers  of  Modern  Times  had  no  trouble  over 
property  or  forms  of  government.  Each 
owned  his  house  and  land,  and  by  mutual 
understanding  political  authority  was  dispensed 
with.  None  felt  responsible  for  the  behavior 
of  his  neighbors,  and  only  aggressive  or  invasive 
conduct  was  resented  by  combined  action. 
The  main  cause  of  the  non-success  of  the 
village  was  the  scarcity  of  employment  other 
than  that  of  agriculture.  Capital  was  needed 
to  start  factories  for  the  manufacture  of  articles 
for  which  there  was  a  demand  in  the  outside 
world.  The  pioneers  had  but  little  resources, 
77 


JOSIAH   WARREN 

and  the  labor-note  currency,  while  of  great 
service  amongst  themselves,  could  not  help 
them  in  transactions  with  those  who  neither 
understood  the  principle  nor  accepted  the 
practice  of  Equitable  Commerce. 

Edward  D.  Linton  set  up  a  paper-box 
manufactory  which  promised  to  furnish  the 
demand  for  labor  that  was  no  less  desirable 
for  the  prosperity  of  the  place  than  essential 
to  its  growth  in  numbers.  This  enterprise 
was  checked  by  the  disastrous  financial  panic 
of  1857  which,  in  New  York  City  alone,  where 
the  product  of  Mr.  Linton 's  factory  was 
marketed,  threw  upwards  of  twenty  thousand 
persons  out  of  work.  Before  the  effects  of 
the  ensuing  industrial  depression  had  cleared 
away,  the  country  was  in  the  throes  of  civil 
war,  and  all  hope  of  regenerating  society  for 
the  time  being  was  dissipated.  Though  the 
original  aims  of  the  pioneers  were  gradually 
lost  sight  of  in  the  inevitable  struggle  for 
existence,  the  village  of  Modern  Times  never 
wholly  departed  from  its  original  spirit  and 
character.  The  co-operative  tendencies  of  the 
78 


MODERN    TIMES 

inhabitants  and  the  pleasant  external  features 
of  the  place  remain,  though  at  the  present 
writing  but  three  of  the  early  pioneers  survive. 

It  is  beyond  question  that  the  gregarious 
instincts  of  men  are  sometimes  inimical  both 
to  the  individual  good  and  the  social  welfare. 
When  resorted  to  for  mutual  aid,  combination 
has  proved  to  be  a  valuable  instrument  of 
civilization.  But  the  union  must  be  for  a 
definite  purpose  and  not  an  excuse  for  shirking 
responsibility.  There  is  nothing  inherently 
good  in  mere  combination.  Union  may  be- 
come a  kind  of  fetish  in  whose  name  the  worst 
abuses  and  most  vicious  tyrannies  are  meekly 
borne.  Nor  could  governments,  unquestioned, 
procure  men  who  have  no  personal  grounds 
for  quarrel  to  slay  one  another  in  unjustifiable 
wars,  were  it  not  for  the  superstition  which 
exalts  and  sanctifies  concerted  action  whether 
right  or  wrong.  Individuals  are  universally 
condemned  for  doing  that  which  an  organized 
body  of  men  may  do  not  only  with  impunity 
but  with  approbation.  There  is  no  surer  way 
to  obtain  and  hold  political  power  than  by 
79 


JOSIAH    WARREN 

appeals  to  the  people  in  the  name  of  patriot- 
ism, national  honor,  the  glory  of  the  republic, 
and  other  catch-words  of  the  rhetoricians. 

The  most  enlightened  minds  are  often 
carried  away  by  the  glamour  surrounding 
collectivity.  Even  Socialists,  in  proclaiming 
the  doctrine  of  the  Social  Organism,  insist  on 
subordinating  the  individual  to  the  aggregation 
we  term  society,  unmindful  that  society  exists 
and  is  maintained  for  the  good  of  the  individuals 
composing  it,  rather  than  that  the  individuals 
exist  for  the  benefit  of  society.  For  unless 
society  subserve  the  welfare  of  its  members 
individually,  what  valid  reason  remains  for  its 
continued  existence? 

These  truths  Warren  perceived  with  un- 
erring instinct.  By  concentrating  his  thought 
he  seemed,  like  most  special  pleaders,  to  ignore 
other  aspects  of  the  subject  no  less  important. 
Disunion,  disconnection,  the  dissolving  of 
associated  interests,  was  his  favorite  theme. 
He  was  especially  severe  on  ill-defined,  com- 
pulsory, and  involving  combinations.  Yet 
there  was  nothing  in  his  teaching  opposed  to 
80 


MODERN    TIMES 

voluntary  association,  though  he  was  inclined 
to  discourage  many  forms  of  united  effort. 

No  important  social  movement  has  yet 
succeeded  without  specific  and  often  arbitrary 
organization.  Mankind  in  its  present  state 
of  development  appears  unable  to  accomplish 
much  without  leaders;  and  it  is  by  means  of 
organization  no  less  than  by  example  that 
leaders  exercise  an  effective  influence.  This  is 
seen  especially  in  politics,  and  holds  equally  in 
other  fields.  But  Warren  lacked  the  ambition, 
even  if  he  possessed  the  capacity,  to  become  an 
organizer  or  a  leader.  His  adherents,  if  they 
ever  looked  to.  him  for  these  qualities,  sought  in 
vain.  He  could  set  them  an  example  in  so 
far  as  his  individual  efforts  went.  They  never 
wavered  in  their  faith  in  the  soundness  of  his 
principles.  Of  his  early  friends  and  followers 
the  few  that  still  live  are  as  firmly  convinced 
now  as  they  ever  were  of  the  truth  of  his 
teaching.  But  the  fact  remains  that  a  new 
social  movement,  if  it  is  to  impress  itself 
permanently  upon  the  thought  and  life  of  the 
age,  must  have  active  and  aggressive  leadership. 
81 


JOSIAH   WARREN 

Warren's  principles  proved  their  value  to 
the  individual  in  his  dealings  with  others,  in 
his  relation  to  society.  As  guides  to  personal 
conduct  they  are  still  impregnable.  How  far 
they  will  inspire  the  individual  to  undertake 
and  carry  out  functions  with  which  society  in 
its  collective  capacity  alone  can  adequately 
deal  remains  a  speculative  question.  It  may 
well  be  doubted,  for  example,  whether  Warren's 
teaching  would  inspire  an  individual  or  group 
to  plan  and  carry  out  so  far-reaching  a  public 
enterprise  as  the  Metropolitan  Park  System 
of  Massachusetts.  Here  we  have  a  Commission 
with  adequate  powers  and  resources  devising 
and  executing  comprehensive  schemes,  requir- 
ing for  their  completion  many  years.  In  this 
instance,  the  community  reaps  beneficial  results 
of  a  lasting  character  despite  the  drawbacks 
now  incident  to  public  undertakings  supported 
by  compulsory  taxation.  It  should  not,  how- 
ever, diminish  the  importance  of  Warren's 
work  in  emphasizing  the  individual  side  of  the 
social  equation  if  we  admit  the  limitations 
of  his  theories. 

82 


IX 

INVENTIONS  IN  PRINTING 

When  the  Equity  movement  began  in  1827, 
it  soon  became  evident  that  no  aid  was  to  be 
expected  from  the  newspapers,  because  the 
latter  depended  for  their  financial  support 
mainly  upon  the  advertisements  of  profit- 
making  traders,  while  the  new  principles 
tended  to  eliminate  the  whole  system  of  profits 
and  the  advertising  puffery  that  props  it  up. 
"It  was  evident,"  said  Warren,  "that  any  new 
truths  which  tended  to  break  up  the  present 
suicidal  and  desolating  habits  of  business  must 
have  a  printing  power  of  their  own,  or  make 
their  way  into  the  world  with  all  the  mighty 
power  of  the  press  against  them.  This  gave 
rise  to  the  design  of  taking  the  printing  power 
out  of  the  exclusive  control  of  merely  mercenary 
managers,  and  making  it  as  accessible  as  the 
use  of  speech  or  the  pen." 

He  began  his  experiments  in  1830  and 
succeeded  in  inventing  an  easily  constructed 
press.  The  principle  of  the  invention  seemed 
83 


JOSIAH   WARREN 

to  Warren  so  very  simple  that  "there  was  no 
equitable  ground  for  a  patent,  and  it  was  given 
to  the  public."  This  press  in  1832  was  publicly 
exhibited  in  New  York,  and  soon  after  the 
firm  of  Hoe  &  Co.  was  supplying  the  large 
offices  with  proof  presses  constructed  on  the 
same  principle. 

To  purchase  fonts  of  type  was  beyond  his 
resources,  so  the  inventor's  next  task  was  to 
devise  a  mode  of  casting  them.  But,  owing 
to  the  fear  engendered  by  his  former  inno- 
vations, he  found  it  impossible  to  procure  in 
Cincinnati  a  type  mould  at  any  price.  Deter- 
mined not  to  be  balked  by  prejudice,  he 
managed  to  gain  admission  to  a  type  foundry 
and  there  saw  the  desired  implements.  He 
then  took  lessons  in  working  steel,  and  soon 
made  a  type  mould  himself.  To  overcome 
the  difficulty  and  expense  of  cutting  a  steel 
punch  for  every  letter,  he  substituted  the  ty  pes 
for  punches  and  warm  lead  for  copper  matrices, 
and  by  this  means  was  able  to  cast  type  which, 
to  judge  from  samples  of  printing  done  seventy 
years  ago,  now  in  the  writer's  possession, 
84 


INVENTIONS  IN  PRINTING 
were  a  credit  to  the  artificer.  His  next  step 
"  was  to  combine  all  the  implements  for  printing 
in  a  single  piece  of  household  furniture  to 
stand  in  the  next  room  to  the  piano,"  which 
he  also  accomplished.  His  intention  was 
"to  domesticate  stereotyping,  and  the  arts 
required  for  printing  drawings,  pictorial  illus- 
trations, maps,  music,  etc."  And  to  this 
work  he  devoted  all  the  time  not  occupied  with 
social  experiments  during  the  remainder  of  his 
life. 

We  have  already  noted  the  use  to  which 
he  put  his  inventions  during  the  cholera  epi- 
demic in  Cincinnati,  and  his  mode  of  getting 
out  The  Peaceful  Revolutionist. 

After  the  break-up  of  the  experiment  in 
Tuscarawas  County,  in  1837,  the  inventor 
moved  to  New  Harmony  where  he  resumed 
his  labors  on  the  printing  press.  He  designed 
and  built  an  entirely  new  kind  of  press,  for 
a  Democratic  paper,  The  South-Western  Sen- 
tinel of  Evansville,  Ind.,  established  in  support 
of  Van  Buren  for  the  Presidency.  The  follow- 
ing description  of  this  original  mechanism 
85 


JOSIAH   WARREN 

is  from  an  editorial  which  appeared  on  Feb.  28, 
1840,  in  the  first  issue  of  this  paper: 

"The  first  number  of  The  South-Western 
Sentinel  is  the  first  newspaper  probably  in 
the  world  which  was  ever  printed  on  a  continu- 
ous sheet.  Our  press  or  printing  machinery  is 
the  invention  of  Mr.  Josiah  Warren  of  New 
Harmony.  He  has  brought  a  series  of  experi- 
ments extending  through  nine  years  to  a 
successful  close,  and  this  machine,  which  he 
calls  his  speed  press,  is  one  of  the  results. 

"  It  receives  the  paper  from  a  roll,  prints  it 
by  means  of  a  roller  and  winds  it  as  it  is  printed 
on  a  second  roll.  It  is  worked  by  a  man  and 
a  boy,  or,  at  somewhat  slower  speed,  by  a  man 
alone.  It  is  supplied  with  self-inking  appa- 
ratus by  which  the  distribution  of  the  ink  is 
strictly  under  control.  Its  construction  through- 
out is  very  simple.  It  has  not  a  single  geared 
wheel  about  it.  It  is  chiefly  composed  of  rollers, 
twenty-three  in  number,  with  several  pulleys.  Its 
form  is  elegant  and  its  appearance  substantial. 

"  The  paper  used  ...  is  cut  into  sheets 
after  it  is  printed ....  Should  the  experiment 
86 


INVENTIONS    IN    PRINTING 

which  has  succeeded  admirably  thus  far,  cause 
the  introduction  of  Mr.  Warren's  printing 
machines  throughout  the  Union,  the  printers' 
vocabulary  will  be  somewhat  changed.  We 
order  not  so  many  reams,  but  so  many  yards, 
of  paper  which  comes  to  us  like  cloth  in  rolls." 

But  this  invention  was  not  destined  to  be 
utilized  for  printing  newspapers  until  more 
than  a  quarter  of  a  century  later.  And  when 
it  was  adopted,  and  roller  presses  became 
general,  Warren  and  his  original  invention 
were  forgotten,  and  others  reaped  the  rewards 
and  got  the  credit  of  the  ideas  originating  with 
the  obscure  and  unambitious  reformer. 

Truly,  the  ways  of  the  innovator,  or  the 
discoverer  of  truth,  whether  in  science,  sociology 
or  mechanics,  are  not  easy  ;  his  paths  are  not 
paths  of  peace.  Warren's  "speed  press"  was 
capable  of  throwing  off  sixty  or  more  copies 
a  minute,  whereas  the  pressman  who  operated 
it  had  never  seen  a  press  print  more  than  five 
or  six  copies  a  minute.  Their  instinct  of  self- 
preservation  at  once  became  aroused,  and 
blind  ignorance  and  pitiful  prejudice  were 
87 


JOSIAH  WARREN 

arrayed  against  the  inventor.  The  trick  of 
the  workmen  was  to  throw  the  press  out  of 
order  at  every  opportunity.  Warren  lived  at 
New  Harmony,  twenty-five  miles  from  Evans- 
ville,  and  in  those  days  it  was  not  always 
a  simple  matter  to  make  the  journey.  But  no 
one  except  the  inventor  could  set  the  press  in 
order  when  it  had  been  maliciously  tampered 
with.  On  several  occasions  Warren  was  sent 
for,  and  came  to  set  the  mechanism  going. 
The  workmen  tried  to  throw  the  blame  of  their 
trickery  upon  the  imperfections  of  the  press. 
The  interests  of  the  paper  suffered  by  the 
troubles  and  delays  that  arose,  while  the 
inventor  began  to  lose  patience  with  his  insidi- 
ous foes.  But  there  was  no  remedy.  He  could 
not  remain  always  in  the  office  of  the  paper  to 
operate  the  press  himself,  so,  after  several 
months  of  conflict  and  experiences  both  mortify- 
ing and  costly,  he  finally  concluded  to  take  the 
press  away  from  Evansville,  believing  that  the 
ignorance  and  selfishness  of  printers  would  not 
permit  the  introduction  of  his  labor-saving 
invention.  One  day  he  arrived  with  several 
88 


INVENTIONS    IN    PRINTING 

wagons  at  the  office  of  the  Sentinel,  took  the 
press  apart,  loaded  it  on  his  wagons,  and 
returned  with  it  to  New  Harmony  where  he, 
in  disgust,  proceeded  to  break  it  up.  The 
stone  press-bed  is  all  that  has  survived,  and 
that  to-day  still  forms  the  front  door-step  of 
a  house  in  New  Harmony. 

Typographical  inventions  again  took  up 
Warren's  attention  upon  the  close  of  the  second 
Time  store  in  1844.  His  purpose  was  to 
extend  his  methods  of  stereotyping  to  all 
varieties  of  printing,  illustration,  and  artistic 
reproduction.  His  improvements  in  this  field 
he  termed  "Universal  Typography."  In  the 
New  Harmony  Indiana  Statesman  for  Oct.  4, 
1845,  appears  an  illustration  which  looks  like 
a  well-executed  wood-cut,  with  the  following 
explanatory  note : 

"We  are  indebted  to  Mr.  Josiah  Warren 
of  this  place  for  the  above  representation  of 
the  steamship  'Great  Britain,' — the  mastodon 
of  the  age.  The  plate  was  executed  by  Mr. 
Warren's  new  stereotyping  process,  and,  al- 
though not  so  perfect  as  it  might  be  made, 
89 


JOSIAH   WARREN 

still  it  serves  to  show  the  usefulness  and  sus- 
ceptibility of  the  invention." 

In  the  Statesman  of  March  7,  1846,  there 
appears  a  notice  of  the  "Universal  Typog- 
raphy," giving  details  of  the  various  kinds 
of  work  of  which  it  was  capable.  The  plates 
were  very  durable  and  cheap,  with  a  smooth, 
glossy  surface  so  like  stone  that  the  inventor 
termed  them  "stone-type."  He  claimed  that 
the  facility  with  which  illustrations  could  be 
got  up,  the  rapidity  of  stereotyping  and  printing 
them,  together  with  the  durability  of  the  plates, 
justified  the  expectation  that  they  would 
ultimately  supersede  wood-cuts,  steel-plate  and 
copper-plate  engraving  and  printing,  and  lith- 
ography. The  process  included  color-printing, 
besides  effects  similar  to  half-tones  of  the  pres- 
ent day.  He  also  invented  a  method  of  address- 
ing wrappers  and  envelopes  which  saved  ninety 
per  cent  of  the  labor  required  by  the  common 
mode. 

While  it  is  doubtful  if  Warren  ever  received 
an  equivalent  for  his  ingenuity,  labor,  and 
outlay  upon  these  inventions,  at  which  he 
90 


INVENTIONS    IN    PRINTING 

worked  during  the  larger  part  of  his  life,  it  is 
certain  that  his  methods  were  utilized  by  others, 
and  the  world  is  accordingly  the  gainer  by  his 
improvements.  The  processes  now  in  use  for 
the  finer  class  of  stereotype  work  are  based 
upon  Warren's  discoveries.  He  occupied  the 
latter  years  of  his  life  with  studies  and  experi- 
ments conducted  with  a  view  to  perfecting  his 
inventions,  and  his  final  results,  it  is  believed, 
were  not  made  known  to  the  world  nor  rendered 
available  when  death  terminated  his  labors. 


91 


LATER   DEVELOPMENTS  AND 
CLOSING  YEARS 

During  one  of  Warren's  visits  to  Boston  in 
1855,  a  gentleman  named  Keith,  of  some 
means  and  much  earnestness,  took  up  the 
reformer's  ideas  and  started  the  Boston  "  House 
of  Equity"  in  a  seven-story  building  in  the 
North  End,  which  he  stocked  with  merchandise 
and  provisions,  selling  them  on  the  Cost 
principle.  During  the  first  week  the  sales 
amounted  to  $1,000  a  day.  In  connection 
with  this  enterprise  Mr.  Keith  projected,  in 
the  fall  of  1855,  a  course  of  twelve  lectures  on 
topics  of  current  interest  by  popular  speakers 
which  proved  to  be  very  successful.  The 
prices  of  admission  were  regulated,  according 
to  Equity,  by  the  cost  of  the  undertaking,  to 
the  general  satisfaction  of  those  who  attended. 
In  order  to  enlarge  the  scope  of  his  work 
Mr.  Keith  hired  a  warehouse  on  Washington 
Street,  and  commenced  to  fit  it  up  for  the  busi- 
ness of  a  general  store  on  a  large  scale.  The 
92 


CLOSING   YEARS 

scheme  included  a  bakery  in  the  lower  part, 
from  which  the  public  was  to  be  supplied  with 
wholesome  bread  at  cost,  and  a  printing  estab- 
lishment that  would  issue  The  People's  Paper, 
then  published  by  Mr.  Keith,  and  other  liter- 
ature of  the  Equity  movement.  An  educa- 
tional department  was  to  be  one  of  the  chief 
features.  When  this  scheme  was  under  way 
a  calamity  befell  the  whole  enterprise  from 
which  it  never  recovered.  The  store,  already 
in  operation,  was  burnt  down,  entailing  a  loss 
of  many  thousand  dollars.  The  fifty  persons 
employed  in  the  business  were  retained  and 
paid  full  wages  by  the  proprietor  for  a  month 
after  the  fire,  as  it  was  expected  the  business 
would  be  resumed.  But  at  this  time  Mr.  Keith 
met  with  severe  financial  reverses  in  South 
America  where  he  had  investments.  As  a 
consequence  of  these  unfortunate  events  his 
extensive  plans  had  to  be  greatly  modified 
and  ultimately  abandoned.  Though  the  com- 
mercial part  of  this  undertaking  was  never 
revived,  its  educational  department  was  re- 
moved to  Chapman  Hall,  in  which  Mr.  Keith 
93 


JOSIAH   WARREN 

with  the  aid  of  a  gentleman  named  Robinson 
continued  the  work.  When  Mr.  Keith's  store 
was  closed,  and  Equity  seemed  to  have  sub- 
sided, the  Boston  Post  in  an  editorial  observed : 
"The  Boston  House  of  Equity  has  closed  its 
operations,  another  evidence  of  the  uncertainty 
of  human  schemes.  There  was,  however, 
a  principle  in  that  store  which,  though  but 
partially  developed,  a  thousand  failures  could 
not  affect."  It  is  related  by  Warren  that  the 
next  day  after  the  store  ceased  to  do  business 
the  price  of  coal  in  Boston  was  raised  by  the 
dealers  two  dollars  a  ton. 

One  of  Mr.  Keith's  plans,  which  was 
carried  out  in  part,  was  to  buy  and  sell  land 
according  to  the  ideas  of  Equity.  A  tract  of 
land  was  secured  in  Cliftondale,  near  Boston, 
and  house  lots  to  the  number  of  four  hun- 
dred were  sold  to  home-seekers  at  prices  not 
enhanced  by  any  profit  or  speculative  value 
beyond  the  first  cost. 

So  popular  had  Equity  become  at  this 
period  as  the  trademark  of  honest  and  fair 
dealing  that  enterprising  merchants,  not  only 
94 


CLOSING   YEARS 

in  Boston  and  the  suburbs,  but  in  several  other 
cities,  placed  over  their  establishments  such 
legends  as  "Equity  Produce  Market,"  "Equity 
Eating  House,"  "Original  Equity  Store,"  and 
so  forth.  These  proceedings,  however,  only 
added  the  needful  spice  of  humor  to  the  move- 
ment. Unscrupulous  but  alert  dealers,  without 
an  idea  of  what  Equity  stood  for,  vied  with  one 
another  for  patronage  by  hoisting  Equity  colors. 
In  July,  1854,  Warren,  while  living  at 
Modern  Times,  began  the  publication  of  his 
"Periodical  Letters,"  which  were  continued, 
though  somewhat  irregularly,  until  the  end  of 
1858.  He  spent  the  winter  of  1855-56  in 
visiting  his  old  friends  in  Ohio  and  Indiana 
and  returned  East  in  March,  1856,  settling  for 
a  while  in  Boston,  from  which  place  he  issued 
the  "  Letters"  monthly  to  the  close  of  the  same 
year,  when  he  again  took  up  his  abode  in  the 
Long  Island  village.  He  returned  to  Boston 
in  1860-61,  and  never  again  visited  Modern 
Times.  In  1863  he  wrote  a  book  containing 
his  reflections  upon  the  Civil  War,  which  added 
little  to  what  he  had  previously  published. 
95 


JOSIAH   WARREN 

Warren's  ideas  were  represented  in  England 
in  1854  by  the  London  Confederation  of 
Rational  Reformers,  which  carried  on  an  active 
propaganda  by  means  of  tracts  and  public 
discussions.  J.  Bronterre  O'Brien,  the  noted 
social  reformer,  became  an  advocate  of  the 
principles  of  Equitable  Commerce.  A.  C. 
Cuddon,  who  paid  a  visit  to  Modern  Times, 
was  another  London  disciple,  to  whom  Warren 
made  over  his  patent  rights  for  Great  Britain  in 
printing  inventions  to  be  used  for  the  further- 
ance of  the  cause.  At  the  meeting  of  the 
British  Association  for  the  Advancement  of 
Science,  in  1855,  William  Parr  of  Dublin,  one 
of  Warren's  friends,  before  the  Statistical 
Section,  on  Sept.  17,  read  a  paper  on  Warren's 
philosophy,  describing  the  Equitable  village 
of  Modern  Times  and  giving  a  concise  and 
sympathetic  account  of  the  movement. 

The  reformer's  activity  declined  with  ad- 
vancing age.  Several  years  were  spent  quietly 
at  Cliftondale,  near  Boston,  and  in  1873  he 
went  to  reside  with  his  friends,  Mr.  and  Mrs. 
Heywood  at  Princeton,  Mass.  It  was  here 
96 


CLOSING   YEARS 

he  wrote  and  printed  his  last  production, 
Part  III.  of  the  "True  Civilization"  series, 
giving  "Practical  Applications"  and  "the  facts 
and  conclusions  of  forty-seven  years'  study 
and  experiments  in  reform  movements  through 
Communism  to  and  in  Elementary  Principles 
found  in  a  direction  exactly  opposite  to  and 
away  from  Communism,  but  leading  directly 
to  all  the  harmonic  results  aimed  at  by  Com- 
munism," comprised  in  forty-eight  small  pages. 
There  was,  however,  less  to  be  found  in  it 
than  the  above  description,  quoted  from  the 
title-page,  would  indicate. 

At  Princeton  typography  occupied  part  of 
the  veteran's  time,  while  his  leisure  was  fre- 
quently beguiled  by  music.  He  sang  and 
performed  on  the  violin  for  the  entertainment 
of  his  friends.  The  last  months  of  his  life 
were  spent  in  Boston,  at  the  house  of  his  early 
friend,  Edward  H.  Linton,  where  he  was  cared 
for  in  his  last  illness  by  kindly  hands.  Miss 
Kate  Metcalf,  one  of  the  pioneers  of  Modern 
Times,  nursed  him  till  the  end.  He  retained 
all  his  faculties,  and  his  intellect  was  clear. 
97 


JOSIAH   WARREN 

His  interest  in  social  reform  remained  unabated. 
In  music  he  never  ceased  to  take  pleasure. 
He  was  attacked  by  dropsy,  which  rendered 
him  unable  to  move  about,  but  he  could  write 
in  his  usual  clear  hand  till  the  last.  Death  he 
awaited  with  calm  resignation  and  hailed  as 
a  much-desired  relief.  His  time  to  rest  had 
come.  On  April  14, 1874,  at  the  age  of  seventy- 
six,  surrounded  by  a  little  band  of  loving 
friends,  he  passed  away. 

Services  were  held  in  Bulfinch  Place  Church 
(Unitarian),  and  his  body  was  interred  in 
Mount  Auburn  Cemetery.  Mr.  Linton's  house 
in  which  he  died,  was  number  29  City  Square, 
Charlestown,  just  a  mile  distant  from  Boston 
City  Hall.  The  house  was  recently  torn  down 
to  make  room  for  the  approach  to  the  new 
bridge  across  the  Charles  River.  In  accordance 
with  his  wish,  no  headstone  marks  the  spot 
where  he  lies.  So  has  it  often  been :  the  world's 
best  and  noblest  quietly  act  their  part,  pass  off 
the  stage  untrumpeted,  and  their  existence  is 
soon  forgotten.  But  the  fruits  of  their  good 
deeds  abide,  and  their  influence  cannot  perish. 


XI 

WARREN'S  PLACE  AS  A  SOCIAL 
PHILOSOPHER 

Individuality  is  the  keynote  of  Warren's 
philosophy.  Everyone  should  be  a  law  unto 
himself,  but  always  exercising  his  liberty  with 
due  regard  to  the  equal  rights  of  others.  This 
conception  of  personal  freedom  precludes  the 
invasion  of  one  person  by  another,  or  of  one 
body  of  people  by  another,  even  a  majority, 
albeit  the  invader  designates  itself  Society, 
the  Government.  It  engenders  respect  for 
others.  It  discards  the  idea  of  common  prop- 
erty or  any  indefinite  combination  of  interests 
that  would  limit  or  diminish  individual  liberty. 

This  doctrine  was  crystalized  in  the 
phrase,  Sovereignty  of  the  Individual,  coined 
by  Warren,  and  borrowed  with  due  acknowledg- 
ment by  John  Stuart  Mill  in  his  famous  essay 
on  "Liberty."  In  his  "Autobiography"  (page 
256),  Mill  speaks  appreciatively  of  "a  remark- 
able American,  Mr.  Warren,"  who  "had 
99 


JOSIAH   WARREN 

formed  a  System  of  Society  on  the  foundation 
of  the  'Sovereignty  of  the  Individual.' ' 
/      Herbert  Spencer  has  made  the  same  prin- 
I  ciple   the   apex   of   his   synthetic   philosophy. 
/  In  "Principles  of  Ethics"  (Part  IV.— Justice) 
I  he  formulates  it  in  the  law  of  equal  freedom. 
"  Every  man  is  free  to  do  that  which  he  wills, 
provided  he  infringes  not  the  equal  freedom 
of  any  other  man."     Whatever  merit  attaches 
to  the  discovery  of  this  principle  of  human 
conduct  as  the  basis  of  a  clear  conception  of 
justice,  it  must  be  credited  to  Josiah  Warren, 
who  first  saw  its  full  significance,  and  demon- 
strated its  practical   applications.     Indeed,  it 
may  be  said  that  to  this  end  he  devoted/with 
admirable  singleness  of  purpose,  his  whole  life. 

When  mankind  comes  to  recognize  this 
/  great  fundamental  truth,  the  need  of  com- 
pulsory, coercive  authority,  as  embodied  in 
government,  will  pass  away.  "Under  the 
plausible  pretext,"  declared  Warren,  "of 'pro- 
tecting person  and  property,  governments  have 
spread  wholesale  destruction,  famine,  and 
misery  all  over  the  earth  where  peace  and 

*  * 

*  100 


WARREN'S   PHILOSOPHY    v 

security  might  otherwise  have  prevailed . . . .  I 
They  have  shed  more  blood,  committed  more  \ 
murders,  tortures,  and  crimes  in  struggles 
against  each  other  for  the  privilege  of  governing 
than  society  would  or  could  have  suffered  in 
the  absence  of  all  governments  whatever." 
While  the  history  of  governments  in  the  past 
affords  warrant  for  this  forcible  condemnation, 
the  events  that  have  elapsed  since  Warren 
wrote  amply  confirm  his  unfavorable  opinion.  / 
"Governments  invade  the  household,"  he 
wrote,  "and  in  sheer  wantonness  presume  to  I 
regulate  the  most  sacred  feelings  of  the  individ- 
ual." They  make  laws  to  which  they  require 
conformity  where  conformity  is  impossible,  and 
while  neither  rulers  nor  ruled  can  tell  how 
such  laws  will  be  interpreted  or  administered. 
Under  these  circumstances  "neither  security 
nor  happiness  can  exist  for  the  governed." 
While  laws  are  subject  to  different  interpre- 
tations according  to  the  whims  or  interests 
of  judges,  lawyers,  juries,  and  other  function- 
aries charged  with  their  execution,  there  can 
be  no  security  for  person  or  property.  Hence 
101 


JOSIAH   WARREN 

no  ' '  form  of  language  is  a  fit  basis  for  human 
institutions."  To  possess  the  interpreting 
power  of  verbal  institutions  is  to  possess 
unlimited  power.  We  must  therefore  begin 
anew.  Instead  of  being  subject  to  institutions 
based  on  language,  which  give  unlimited  power 
to  others,  we  must  build  upon  the  unwritten, 
unspoken  law  within  us, —  each  being  a  law 
unto  himself.  "Everyone  must  feel  that  he  is 
the  supreme  arbiter  of  his  own  [destiny],  that 
no  power  on  earth  shall  rise  over  him,  that  he 
is  and  always  shall  be  sovereign  of  himself  and 
all  relating  to  his  individuality.  Then  only 
shall  all  men  realize  security  of  person  and 
^property." 

In  this  fashion  Warren  formulated  the 
ideal  of  modern  Anarchism, —  "each  being 
a  law  unto  himself"  without  violating  the  like 
freedom  of  any  other  person.  Neither  Warren 
nor  his  disciples,  however,  have  held  that  all 
men  are  at  present  developed  to  the  degree  that 
none  will  consciously  invade  another's  rights 
or  abridge  his  liberty.  They  declare  rather  that 
the  ideal  law  should  always  be  upheld  as  the 
102 


WARREN'S   PHILOSOPHY 

guide  and  rule  of  social  conduct  ;  meanwhile 
admitting  that  voluntary  organization  will  still 
be  necessary  to  defend  the  individual  against 
aggression  or  invasion  by  unsocial  and  criminal 
members  of  society.  It  is  true  that  this  pro- 
tective function  is  now  assumed  by  the  State, 
but  its  police  and  punitive  machinery  has  all 
the  defects  of  antiquated  institutions  which  have 
survived  both  in  spirit  and  in  fact  from  the 
distant  past. 

That  the  scales  of  justice  are  wont  to  fall 
on  the  side  with  the  heaviest  purse,  that  blind 
justice  herself  frequently  miscarries,  that  crime 
often  goes  unpunished  even  when  detected, 
are  matters  of  common  knowledge  that  need  no 
demonstration.  While  not  denying  the  neces-^. 
sity  for  restraining  criminals  and  preventing 
aggression,  it  is  easy  to  show  that  the  State 
proves  itself  incompetent  and  uncertain  in  this 
its  own  prescriptive  field.  Indeed,  if  it  have  no 
better  grounds  to  rest  upon,  it  must  be  con- 
demned as  inadequate.  Its  function  can  be 
carried  out  with  greater  efficiency  and  certainty 
by  a  system  of  free  association,  a  kind  of- 
103 


JOSIAH    WARREN 

protective  insurance.  Voluntary  organization 
has  accomplished  even  more  delicate  and 
difficult  tasks  in  the  social  economy. 

But  if  the  arbitrary  authority  of  government 
can  be  dispensed  with,  the  numerous  and 
ever-growing  functions  it  has  assumed,  ostensi- 
bly for  the  good  of  the  community,  can  equally 
well  be  taken  away  and  the  like  kind  of  service 
be  performed  by  voluntary  agency.  To  destroy 
irresponsible  authority,  which  thrives  no  less 
under  democracy  than  under  despotism,  every 
support  must  be  removed.  According  to 
\1  Warren's  ideas,  all  business  now  carried  on  by 

i 

\government  activity  should  be  free  to  be  con- 
\ducted  by  voluntary,  non-compulsory,  co- 
Operative  agencies,  or  by  private  enterprise. 
Only  where  responsibility  can  be  quickly  and 
certainly  fixed  do  we  obtain  satisfactory  results. 
All  experience  in  public  affairs,  whether  munici- 
pal or  national,  confirms  this  dictum.  The 
complaints  and  criticisms  of  civic  reformers 
invariably  teem  with  illustrations. 

To  sum  up  on  this  point:  There  is  no 

(service  undertaken  by  government  that  could 
104 


WARREN'S    PHILOSOPHY 

not  be  more  efficiently  and  more  economically    i 
performed  by  associated  or  individual  effort 
springing  up  naturally  to  meet   the    needs  of 
society.     Protection  of  person   and   property, 
the  administration  of  justice,  as  already  pointed 
out,  education  in  its  widest  sense,  sanitation,  ? 
even  territorial  defense,  could  be  accomplished, 
as  we    see   to-day    numberless    difficult   and 
socially  necessary  functions  carried  on  without 
subordinating  the  citizens  to  arbitrary  power. 

In  truth,  it  is  the  differentiation  and  spe- 
cialization of  activities,  the  non-invasive  and 
voluntary  division  of  social  labor,  which  con- 
stitute progress  and  render  possible  true 
civilization.  Such  a  disintegration  of  political 
power  is  possible,  however,  only  when  accom- 
panied by  certain  economic  changes  intimately 
bound  up  with  the  question  of  the  just  reward 
of  labor.  The  labor  problem  must  be  solved 
so  that  each  may  receive  the  full  fruits  of  his  f 
industry. 

Equity  demands  that  all  natural  opportuni- 
ties requisite  to  the  production  of  wealth  be 
accessible  to  all  on  equal  terms.     Monopolies 
105 


JOSIAH   WARREN 

arising  from  special  privileges  created  by  law 

MMMBMBIWA*  *  A  °     . 

will  then  disappear.  The  Cost  principle  rather 
than  the  necessities  of  the  consumer  Will  govern 
price.  The  laborer,  by  means  of  a  medium 
of  exchange  representing  labor  or  its  products, 
will  receive  his  just  reward.  It  may  be  pointed 
out  that  there  is  a  tendency  all  the  time  toward 
the  practical  realization  of  cost  as  the  limit  of 
price  in  so  far  as  free  competition  is  operative. 
Whenever  competition  prevails  there  is  at  once 
an  approximation  of  price  to  cost.  The  regu- 
lator of  price  at  the  present  time  in  transactions 
between  business  men  is  the  Cost  principle. 
It  is  this  that  tends  to  harmonize  interests 
otherwise  conflicting.  It  promotes  co-operation 
and  renders  it  advantageous  for  all  industrial 
interests  to  reduce  cost.  In  other  words, 
while  free  competition  will  lead  to  the  adoption 
of  the  Cost  principle,  the  Cost  principle  itself 
will  inevitably  bring  about  co-operation  and 
mutual  aid.  In  this  way,  under  freedom  and 
equity  would  disappear  the  disastrous,  because 
one-sided,  competition  which  to-day  we  deplore. 
Under  such  conditions  the  more  difficult, 
106 


WARREN'S   PHILOSOPHY 

laborious,  and  repugnant  the  labor,  the  higher 
the  price  it  would  command.  Abolish  all  law- 
made  privileges  and  give  competition  free  play 
and  this,  says  Warren,  will  be  precisely  the 
result. 

That  Warren,  the  New  England  Puritan, 
was  the  progenitor  of  Philosophical  Anarchism 
is  strictly  true, —  not  only  because  he  taught 
as  a  political  doctrine  the  negation  of  all  au- 
thority, but  by  reason  of  his  personal  influence 
upon  some  of  those  who  to-day  stand  for  this 
social  principle.  While  Robert  Owen  has  been 
called  the  father  of  Socialism  as  a  moral  doc- 
trine, Josiah  Warren  may  be  described  as  the 
real  founder  of  its  economic  teaching. 

It  was  Adam  Smith  who  said  that  the 
produce  of  labor  constitutes  the  natural  recom- 
pense or  wages  of  labor.  Ricardo,  enlarging 
upon  Smith's  views,  formulated  the  Time,  or 
Labor,  theory  of  value.  Out  of  these  teachings 
arose  a  doctrine  common  to  all  schools  of 
Socialism:  "Labor  creates  all  wealth.  Labor 
is  therefore  the  true  measure  of  price."  Proud- 
hon,  the  French  Anarchist,  and  Marx,  the 
107 


JOSIAH   WARREN 

German  Revolutionary  Socialist,  agree  in 
basing  their  economic  systems  upon  this 
generalization.  But  Warren,  before  either, 
as  early  as  1827,  recognized  this  principle, 
and  upon  it  founded  a  scheme  of  social  reform. 
Thus,  in  different  ways,  in  different  countries, 
and  in  different  languages,  Proudhon  and  Marx 
arrived  at  the  same  conclusion  respecting 
labor  and  its  product  which  Warren,  unaided 
by  familiarity  with  the  economists,  had  already 
by  practical  experiments  endeavored  to  demon- 
strate. 

Value,  according  to  Warren,  meant  use- 
value  or  utility,  and  ought  not  to  be  the  regu- 
lator of  price.  The  worth  or  value  of  an 
article  to  the  user  should  never  be  permitted 
to  determine  what,  in  the  language  of  political 
economy,  is  termed  exchange  value.  Thus, 
a  cup  of  water  to  a  person  dying  of  thirst, 
although  it  cost  nothing,  may  be  invaluable. 
A  loaf  of  bread  to  a  starving  man,  though  it 
cost  but  five  cents,  may  be  beyond  price.  It 
is  not,  therefore,  the  worth  or  value  of  a  com- 
modity, not  its  scarcity,  nor  the  necessities  of  the 
108 


WARREN'S    PHILOSOPHY 

consumer,  that  forms  the  true  basis  of  its  price, 
but  its  cost  to  the  producer, —  meaning  by 
cost,  all  the  sacrifices  entailed  in  its  production. 
To  the  question,  What  is  equitable  compen- 
sation? Warren  answers:  It  is  an  equal 
amount  of  labor  measured  by  its  repugnance. 
In  his  system  there  was  no  confusion  between 
exchange  value  and  utility.  Price,  which  is 
the  monetary  expression  of  exchange  value, 
would  be  governed  strictly  by  cost, —  would 
depend  on  the  amount  of  labor  or  sacrifice 
involved.  The  things  that  cost  no  labor, 
though  of  great  utility,  such  as  natural  oppor- 
tunities in  land,  minerals,  water,  should  there- 
fore cease  to  be  private  monopolies  and  be 
freely  accessible  on  equal  terms  to  all.  This 
view  also,  it  should  be  noted,  is  common  to 

.-••'•--' 

Socialism  of  whatever  school. 

Warren's  theories  of  value  and  the  reward 
of  labor  were  not  at  any  time  put  forth  as 
an  explanation  of  existing  economic  phenomena, 
but  rather  as  the  principles  which,  in  a  perfectly 
free  state  of  society,  would  govern  economic 
relations.  They  were  deductions  from  an  ideal 
109 


JOSIAH   WARREN 

conception  of  justice.  With  this  point  borne 
in  mind  it  will  be  seen  that  the  Jevonian  criti- 
cism of  the  Ricardo-Marx  doctrine,  held  by 
later  economists  and  many  Socialists  to  be 
a  complete  demolition  of  the  "Time  theory" 
of  value,  leaves  Warren's  position  unshaken. 
Nor  is  this  all.  Some  of  Ruskin's  soundest 
and  most  durable  work  in  economics  is  a  confir- 
mation and  vindication  of  the  essential  doctrines 
taught  by  Warren.  One  of  the  results  of 
Warren's  practical  co-operative  experiments 
was  to  explode  the  time-worn  fallacy  of  the 
economists  that  labor  is  dependent  on  capital, 
that  wages  are  paid  out  of  capital.  Without 
gold  or  silver,  without  accumulated  capital,  he 
showed  in  very  deed  how  labor  could  produce 
and  exchange  wealth  on  equitable  terms. 
But  it  was  Ruskin's  unanswerable  criticisms 
of  orthodox  political  economy  and  not  Warren's 
labors  that  finally  compelled  its  expounders  to 
abandon  these  long-cherished  errors. 

The  student  of  Ruskin  as  an  economist, 
who  is  familiar  with  Warren's  views,  cannot 
fail  to  be  impressed  with  their  unity  of  spirit 
110 


WARREN'S    PHILOSOPHY 

as  well  as  identity  of  principle.  In  his  economic 
writings,  particularly  in  "Munera  Pulveris," 
Ruskin  with  matchless  lucidity  elaborates  and 
illumines  the  problems  of  labor,  value,  money, 
and  interest,  on  lines  first  laid  down  by  Warren 
and  by  Proudhon.  Not  that  Ruskin  is  at  all 
times  in  harmony  with  the  ideas  of  these 
thinkers,  or  that  he  conceived  their  doctrines  in 
just  the  way  they  did;  but  in  fundamentals,  in 
his  claims  for  justice  to  the  laborer,  in  upholding 
the  dignity  of  labor,  and  the  necessity  for  all 
to  work  in  a  well-ordered  state  of  society,  in 
his  fearless  and  convincing  exposure  of  the 
weakness,  folly,  and  injustice  of  our  economic 
system,  Ruskin  stands  shoulder  to  shoulder 
with  the  American  "Peaceful  Revolutionist" 
on  the  one  side  and  the  French  Anarchist 
philosopher  on  the  other. 

The  outcome  of  Warren's  theory  of  value, 
of  Cost  the  Limit  of  Price,  was  to  place  him 
squarely  in  line  with  the  cardinal  doctrine  of 
all  other  schools  of  modern  socialism.  He 
believed  that  labor  was  robbed  through  rent, 
interest,  and  profit,  and  his  aim,  like  that  of 
111 


JOSIAH    WARREN 

the  Socialists,  was  to  prevent  these  modes  of 
exploitation.  He  differed  from  them  only  as 
to  the  means  to  be  adopted.  Like  Henry 
George  and  his  disciples,  he  held  it  to  be 
unjust  that  some  should  be  permitted  to  monop- 
olize natural  resources,  the  raw  material  out 
of  which  labor  creates  wealth,  to  compel  tribute 
under  the  guise  of  rent  for  the  privilege  of 
using  land,  or  mines,  or  water,  which  are 
indispensable  for  man's  support.  But  unlike 
the  Single  Taxers,  Warren  would  not  have 
the  State  become  the  one  great  monopolist 
exacting  rent  from  the  user.  In  applying  his 
principles  to  land  values,  Warren's  followers 
assert  that  use  is  the  only  just  title  to  land. 
jfTo-day  the  landlord  is  protected  by  the  State 
In  holding  land  which  he  does  not  and  cannot 
Ipse,  except  for  speculative  purposes.  He  can 
thus  compel  the  payment  of  rent  by  him  who 
is  willing  to  use  it.  The  principle  of  Equity 
in  making  occupancy  and  use  the  sole  condition 
of  possession  at  once  abolishes  monopoly, 
that  is,  the  right  to  exclude  others  from  oppor- 
tunities which  the  monopolist  cannot  himself 
112 


WARREN'S  PHILOSOPHY 
productively  use.  It  accords  with  equal  liberty 
and  so  renders  substantial  justice.  While 
affording  to  all  who  desire  it  the  opportunity 
to  occupy  and  use  all  vacant  or  unutilized  land, 
it  secures  to  the  present  occupants,  who  are 
legitimately  using  their  holdings,  undisputed 
permanent  possession. 

Interest,  says  Warren,  is  due  to  the  monop- 
oly of  the  medium  of  exchange,  which  rests  on 
laws  and  special  privileges  maintained  for  the 
benefit  of  the  few, —  the  bankers  and  capitalists. 
Money  itself  has  no  power  of  reproduction.  ? 
It  is  fruitful  only  when  used  by  labor  in  facili- 
tating production  and  distribution.  Interest  is 
not  the  natural  progeny  of  money  but  is  paid 
in  the  long  run  out  of  the  product  of  labor. 
It  arises  from  the  system  of  finance  that  creates 
an  artificial  scarcity  of  the  medium  of  exchange. 
Under  free  competition,  with  all  legal  restrictions 
upon  the  issuing  of  money  removed,  interest 
would  fall  to  the  cost  of  carrying  on  the  business 
of  lending.  It  would  not  exceed  the  average 
cost  of  conducting  a  bank,  which  is  now  not 
over  one-half  of  one  per  cent  per  annum. 
113 


JOSIAH  WARREN 
Warren's  contention  is  that  the  equita- 
ble measure  of  the  lender's  compensation 
is  the  cost  of  lending, —  the  average  amount 
of  labor  required  in  such  transactions.  Thus 
would  he  demonstrate  that  neither  landlord 
nor  usurer  could  enforce  his  claims  upon  in- 
dustry unless  upheld  in  his  privileges  by  gov- 
ernmental authority 

Profit,  when  differentiated  from  rent,  in- 
terest, and  compensation  of  labor,  is  the  excess 
of  price  above  cost,  and  it  will  be  gradually 
eliminated  as  competition  becomes  more  uni- 
versal and  privilege  disappears.  Under  such 
conditions  the  merchant  and  middleman  must 
be  satisfied  with  gains  that  will  cover  only  the 
average  cost  of  their  labor  and  experience  in 
conducting  business.  Monopoly  as  a  source 
of  profit  will  no  longer  be  a  tax  upon  industry, 
for  in  the  absence  of  political  authority  monop- 
oly will  lose  its  power  of  extortion. 

Money,  as  defined  by  Warren,  is  a  docu- 
ment ;  it  should  be  merely  a  representative  of 
a  definite  quantity  of  property.     This  alone  is 
the  true  function  of  a  medium  of  exchange. 
114 


WARREN'S  PHILOSOPHY 
A  scientifically  perfect  currency  ought  to  be 
capable  of  expanding  and  contracting  in 
volume  according  to  the  demand  for  it.  The 
restrictions  which  governments  have  at  all 
times  assumed  the  right  to  place  upon  the 
issuing  and  the  use  of  money  should  never  have 
been  permitted.  The  producer  will  remain 
an  industrial  slave  while  enthralled  by  the 
capitalist  and  beholden  to  the  money  monopolist 
for  the  means  of  labor  and  exchange.  Money 
based  upon  labor  or  its  product  will  at  one 
stroke  make  the  laborer  free  and  destroy  the 
power  of  those  who  now  live  upon  his  unpaid 
toil. 

Ruskin,  following  the  same  line  of  thought, 
defines  money  thus:  "The  currency  of  any 
country  consists  of  every  document  acknowl- 
edging debt  which  is  transferable  in  the 
country."  (Munera  Pulveris,  Chap.  III.) 
Warren's  labor  note  is  one  of  the  simplest 
forms  of  currency.  In  its  original  form  it  is 
not  designed  for  the  needs  of  a  complex  com- 
mercial system,  but  the  principle  is  sound  and 
needs  only  to  be  adapted  to  the  requirements 
115 


JOSIAH   WARREN 

of  industry.  This  was  done  by  Proudhon  in 
France  when  he  generalized  the  Bill  of  Ex- 
change, and  organized  a  "Bank  of  the  People," 
to  demonstrate  the  feasibility  of  a  system  of 
credit  based  upon  labor.  In  America,  Colonel 
W.  B.  Greene  elaborated  the  same  ideas  into 
a  plan  of  mutual  banking,  showing  how  the 
credit  of  individuals  could  be  converted  into 
a  safe,  effective,  and  sound  currency.  The 
theory  of  the  Mutual  Bank  is  the  leading 
economic  reform  advocated  by  Warren's  suc- 
cessors, the  Philosophical  Anarchists.  It  is 
the  principle  of  free  competition  applied  to 
the  money  problem.  Its  aim  is  to  place  the 
currency  under  the  control  of  the  producers 
by  basing  money,  not  upon  metal,  but  upon 
property.  The  volume  of  money  could  then 
be  adapted  with  precision  to  the  demand  for 
it,  and  interest  would  naturally  fall  to  the  cost 
of  issuing  and  guaranteeing  money  instead  of 
being  fixed  by  an  artificially  maintained 
scarcity. 

Where  labor  has  free  access  to  land  and 
other  raw  material,  it  becomes  in  truth  what 
116 


WARREN'S    PHILOSOPHY 

Warren  termed  "Labor-capital,"  and  under 
the  comparatively  primitive  industrial  condi- 
tions that  prevailed  in  the  Equity  and  similar 
co-operative  communities,  labor  is  not  de-  . 
pendent  on  accumulated  capital.  But  in  the 
present  complex  stage  of  industrialism,  the  de- 
mand  for  labor  depends  largely  upon  the  avail-  ( 
ability  of  capital  for  production.  A  system  of 
free  trade  in  capital  such  as  Mutual  Banking  '• 
contemplates  will  affect  labor  and  wages  bene- 
ficially by  throwing  into  productive  channels 
capital  which  is  not  now  available,  owing  to 
the  money  monopoly  and  consequent  exorbitant 
rate  of  interest  ;  the  quickened  enterprise  and 
expanded  production  arising  from  an  abundant 
currency  and  available  capital  will  thus  create  a 
demand  for  labor  that  must  raise  wages  to  a 
point  coincident  with  the  value  of  its  product. 
No  longer  protected  by  privilege,  the  capitalist 
will  then  be  subject  to  competition,  and  the 
very  agency  which  heretofore  has  condemned 
the  laborer  to  accept  a  mere  subsistence  wage 
will  in  that  case  work  equally  well  to  protect 
him  from  exploitation  by  the  capitalist. 
117 


JOSIAH   WARREN 

Nor  can  any  political  scheme  or  legislative 
enactment  so  surely  raise  the  wages  of  labor 
to  its  natural  recompense,  the  product  of  labor, 
as  the  economic  effect  of  a  steady  and  increasing 
demand  for  labor  due  to  free  competition 
amongst  the  possessors  of  capital,  which  will 
be  the  inevitable  result  of  free,  accessible,  and 
abundant  money.  In  a  radical  scheme  of 
economic  and  industrial  reform  which  does  not 
contemplate  communism  on  the  one  hand,  nor 
State-ownership  of  the  means  of  production  on 
the  other,  it  becomes,  therefore,  the  first  step 
to  overthrow  the  money  monopoly  and  democ- 
ratize the  medium  of  exchange  by  basing  it, 
not  upon  a  single  or  a  double  metal,  but  upon 
all  products  of  labor,  and  by  this  means  capi- 
talizing every  form  of  wealth. 

Although  it  appears  to  have  been  beyond 
Warren's  sphere  to  work  out  the  details  of 
a  comprehensive  scheme  of  financial  reform, 
yet  he  believed  that  in  the  solution  of  the 
money  problem  primarily  lay  the  salvation  of 
the  laborer  and  the  elimination  of  the  idle 
rich  and  other  non-productive  classes. 
118 


WARREN'S   PHILOSOPHY 

Throughout  the  writings  of  Robert  Owen, 
covering  half  a  century,  the  diligent  student  will 
find  that,  despite  the  various  theories  and 
schemes  of  reform  which  he  untiringly  advo- 
cated, Owen  at  no  time  lost  sight  of  the  funda- 
mental importance  of  a  complete  and  far- 
reaching  change  in  the  existing  monetary 
system.  Proudhon  not  only  saw  the  vital 
nature  of  money  in  the  economic  relations  of 
society,  but  propounded  a  solution  of  the  whole 
social  question  based  upon  a  new  system  of 
money.  Karl  Marx  was  too  much  absorbed 
in  working  out  his  theory  of  surplus  value  to 
recognize  the  importance  of  a  radical  reform 
in  the  medium  of  exchange.  In  the  economic 
field  no  less  than  in  the  political,  Proudhon 's 
teaching  is  substantially  in  accord  with 
Warren's,  but  Marx  differs  from  Warren,  not 
in  the  application  he  made  of  the  principle  that 
labor  is  the  true  measure  of  price,  but  funda- 
mentally in  his  failure  to  comprehend  the  idea 
of  Individual  Sovereignty, —  to  see  the  impor- 
tance of  free  competition  and  complete  equal 
liberty  as  the  primary  conditions  of  economic 
119 


JOSIAH   WARREN 

freedom.  In  short,  Warren  and  Proudhon  are 
libertarians,  while  Marx  and  cognate  schools  of 
Socialists  are  authoritarians. 

Notwithstanding  the  practical  agreement  of 
Ruskin  with  Warren  and  Proudhon  in  financial 
and  economic  principles,  the  force  of  his  efforts 
is  weakened  by  his  inability  to  grasp  the  signifi- 
cance of  the  basic  doctrine  of  individual  liberty. 
Ruskin 's  views  were  paternalistic  if  not  authori- 
tarian ;  he  leaned  toward  government  as  the 
agency  for  improving  economic  conditions 
rather  than  belief  in  the  free  individual  volun- 
tarily working  out  his  social  salvation  independ- 
ent of  all  external  authority.  Had  Ruskin 
been  able  to  grasp  this  principle  it  would  have 
unified  and  given  point  to  his  work  as  a  social 
reformer  and  would  have  placed  him  among 
the  greatest  of  them  all. 

Warren  was  never  a  mere  theorist.  He 
grappled  with  the  elemental  problems  of  life, — 
social,  moral,  and  material.  A  true  pioneer, 
he  was  fitted  by  inclination  and  experience  to 
perform  many  things  essential  to  the  building 
120 


WARREN'S  PHILOSOPHY 
up  of  a  new  settlement.  He  understood 
practically  the  clearing  of  forest  land,  the 
building  of  dwellings  without  costly  materials, 
the  laying  out  of  streets,  the  starting  of  manu- 
factures, and  the  multifarious  details  pertaining 
to  the  beginnings  of  a  township.  He  was 
skilled  in  several  trades,  and  was  not  only 
competent  himself  to  teach  the  young,  but, 
fifty  years  before  the  advent  of  the  Trades 
School  or  the  Manual  Training  system,  Warren 
recognized  the  value  of  practical  mechanical 
instruction  as  an  indispensable  part  of  the 
education  of  children.  He  believed  that  all 
young  people  should  be  prepared  to  become 
self-supporting  citizens  by  being  taught  useful 
trades.  He  claimed  nothing  for  boys  in 
education  that  he  did  not  accord  to  girls,  and 
his  efforts  were  always  devoted  toward  equaliz- 
ing industrial  conditions  for  both  sexes.  He 
was  one  of  the  first  to  try  to  break  down 
the  apprenticeship  system  which  made  every 
useful  art  at  once  a  mystery  and  a  monopoly. 

An  expert  musician,  a  successful  teacher, 
many   of   his    pupils   earned   distinction    and 
121 


JOSIAH  WARREN 
themselves  became  teachers  and  leaders  in 
their  profession.  His  knowledge  of  printing 
extended  to  all  its  branches.  In  this  field  alone 
his  inventions  would  have  made  the  fortune 
of  any  man  not  so  entirely  devoid  of  pecuniary 
acquisitiveness.  The  purpose  to  which  his 
life  was  devoted  was  not  one  that  brings  emolu- 
ment, praise,  or  fame.  Only  the  obscure  and 
lowly  were  the  object  of  his  unceasing  efforts. 

Warren's  work  in  political  philosophy  was 
to  show  that  the  glittering  generalities  of  the 
American  and  French  revolutions  could  be 
reduced  to  e very-day  practice.  He  carried 
to  their  ultimate  conclusions  the  ideas  of 
Jefferson  and  of  Paine.  With  him  the  rights 
of  man  implied  the  responsibilities  as  well  as 
the  opportunities  of  man.  If  man  be  sovereign 
of  himself,  the  forms  of  law  and  government 
must  be  subordinated  and  moulded  so  as  to 
permit  the  complete  realization  of  that  con- 
ception. 

Nothing  militates  more  against  social  har- 
mony  than  indefiniteness  of  obligation.     The 
credit  system,  resulting  from  the   law-created 
122 


WARREN'S  PHILOSOPHY 

scarcity  of  the  medium  of  exchange,  and 
combined  interests  that  crush  out  individu- 
ality, are  equally  foes  of  personal  freedom. 
Hence  Warren  would  deprive  the  State  of  all 
power  to  issue  or  control  the  money  of  the 
people  ;  and  he  perceived  inherent  evil  in  every 
form  of  combination  coercively  maintained. 
It  is  not  each  other,  but  our  intercourse  with 
each  other,  that  needs  regulation.  The  most 
important  part  of  the  work  of  reform  is  that 
which  should  be  left  undone.  The  natural  \ 
government  of  consequences,  rather  than  \ 
legislative  enactments,  is  the  only  authority 

to  which  mankind  should  conform. 

.  — 

Warren's  first  incentive  to  social  reform 
came  from  Robert  Owen.  To  Owen  he  was 
indebted  for  his  views  in  regard  to  the  effect  of 
environment  on  character,  though  he  did  not 
accept  Owen's  fundamental  doctrine  that  man 
is  entirely  the  creature  of  circumstances. 
Compared  with  Owen,  the  father  of  the  Equity 
movement  lacked  both  the  organizing  and 
administrative  capacity  which  the  founder 
of  New  Harmony  possessed  in  a  preeminent 
123 


JOSIAH   WARREN 

degree.  Neither  of  these  reformers  enjoyed 
literary  gifts  such  as  would  enable  him  to  make 
his  mark  as  a  writer.  Both  put  their  views 
to  the  test  of  actual  experience  before  giving 
their  results  to  the  world.  Owen  was  an 
indefatigable  public  speaker,  and  to  say  that  he 
was  a  voluminous  writer  is  to  describe  his 
efforts  too  mildly.  Once  fairly  launched  as 
a  public  agitator,  he  wrote  incessantly  for  over 
forty  years.  Warren  rarely  spoke  in  public, 
wrote  little,  and  published  less.  His  writings 
on  social  reform,  if  collected,  would  scarcely 
fill  one  good-sized  volume. 

Owen  made  his  influence  felt  and  his  ideas 
known  throughout  the  world.  Kings,  nobles, 
and  statesmen  were  eager  students  of  his 
theories.  At  the  outset  he  impressed  the 
rulers  of  the  earth,  but  he  failed  to  gain  the 
confidence  of  the  laboring  classes.  His  fame 
was  world-wide, —  first,  as  the  greatest  philan- 
thropist and  most  practical  reformer  of  the  age  ; 
finally,  as  the  wildest  visionary  and  most 
dangerous  revolutionist  upon  the  earth.  Warren 
throughout  his  life  remained  obscure.  He 
124 


\ 


WARREN'S   PHILOSOPHY 

studiously  avoided  publicity  and  believed  that 
his  principles  would  in  the  long  run  be  accepted 
on  their  merits,  regardless  of  his  own  part  in 
their  discovery  or  propagation.  Emperors 
never  sought  his  advice,  nor  were  prime 
ministers  his  disciples.  It  was  not  Warren, 
the  American,  but  Owen,  the  British  Socialist, 
that  President,  Cabinet,  and  Congress  assem- 
bled to  hear  deliver  from  the  Speaker's  chair 
in  the  Capitol  six  consecutive  lectures  upon  his 
favorite  theories.  In  his  efforts  during  many 
years  of  activity  as  a  reformer,  Owen  worked 
from  the  top  downward,  thereby  hoping  in  time 
to  reach  the  lower  strata  of  society.  Warren's 
mission  was  not  to  the  rich  or  powerful.  His 
energies  were  directed  to  showing,  mainly  by 
example,  how  the  toiling  masses  might  them- 
selves work  out  their  economic  independence. 
Owen  to  the  last  believed  that  the  work  of 
reform,  of  the  alleviation  of  suffering  due  to 
economic  maladjustments,  was  the  business  of 
governments.  His  chief  hope  for  improvement 
lay  in  the  direction  of  beneficent  authority. 
Warren  on  the  other  hand  looked  upon  govern- 
125 


JOSIAH   WARREN 

ments    as    enemies    to    all    permanent    social 
,  progress.     Only   from   individuals    can    come 

the  impetus  to  reform.     Statute  laws  are  at 
* 

best   hindrances,   and   must   be   swept   away, 
not  by  violence,  but  by  the  slowly  evolved  sense 

S      "*«*•*»» ';    «  «  •         .  , 

of  justice   and  equity  which  will  eventually 
undermine  all  surviving  forms  of  authority. 

Some  of  Owen's  best  thoughts,  where  not 
already  reduced  to  general  practice,  are  still 
embodied  in  Socialistic  demands.  While  the 
world  must  ever  remain  indebted  to  him  as  an 
indefatigable  humanist,  his  paternalistic  theo- 
ries belong  to  the  past  and  have  only  transitional 
value.  Warren's  ideals  concerning  free  indi- 
viduality and  equity  are  admitted  by  progressive 
reformers  to  be  essentials  of  a  higher  state  of 
civilization,  demanding  a  prominent  place  in 
the  social  philosophy  of  the  future. 


126 


APPENDIX 

(This  letter  from  Josiah  Warren  to  a  friend, 
besides  revealing  something  of  the  man  and  his 
mode  of  thought  within  a  year  of  his  death,  has 
an  interest  as  the  last  published  writing  of  the 
reformer.} 

I  am  tired  of  words,  especially  on  new 
subjects,  where  one  word  requires  half  a  dozen 
to  explain  it,  and  a  dozen  more  to  explain  the 
explanations  ;  and  I  will  try  here  to  speak  so 
plainly  that  no  future  explanations  will  be 
necessary :  for  I  feel  that  I  can  do  so  consistently 
with  our  mutual  understanding  of  the  great 
peace-making  fact  that  freedom  to  differ  is 
the  key-note  to  social  harmony  ;  and  I  add  that 
if  this  key-note  is  kept  sufficiently  prominent 
no  discords  that  can  be  introduced,  can  entirely 
destroy  the  symmetry  of  the  composition. 

A  man  who  had  seen  a  good  deal  of  the 
practical  operations  of  the  new  principles,  said  : 
"  There !  you  are  all  right,  now  what  you  want 
is  a  race  that  can't  talk" 
127 


JOSIAH   WARREN 

I  am  satisfied  that  the  largest  portion  of  our 
disturbances  grow  out  of  the  ambiguity  of  our 
language:  For  instance,  you  speak  of  my 
"exceeding  sensitiveness  to  criticism."  I  don't 
know  whether  you  intend  this  as  a  compliment 
or  otherwise  ;  but  however  intended,  I  at  once 
admit  its  entire  truth.  Having  spent  a  long 
life  in  trying  to  find  the  roots  of  human  miseries, 
and  believing  that  I  have  succeeded,  I  freely 
admit  that  I  am  very  sensitive  to  the  manner 
in  which  the  results  of  a  long  life's  labor  are 
received  and  treated  by  the  public  —  not  so 
much  for  my  own,  as  for  their  sake. 

I  have  said  repeatedly  that  wholesale 
denunciation  of  ordinary  business  men  as 
"thieves  and  robbers"  because  they  live  on 
profits,  is,  first  of  all,  untrue:  because  these 
words,  according  to  prevailing  usage,  apply 
only  to  those  who  know  and  profess  themselves 
to  be  thieves  or  robbers. 

It  is  also  untrue  in  another  respect.  Men 
may  live  on  the  profits  of  their  business  and  yet 
not  get  a  tenth  part  of  an  Equitable  compen- 
sation for  their  time  and  trouble.  It  is  also 
128 


APPENDIX 

philosophically  wrong  to  punish  people  for 
being  what  their  birth,  training  and  surround- 
ings make  them.  And  this  hostile  attitude 
toward  them  is  unnecessarily  offensive  and 
insulting,  and  tends  to  repel  many  of  the  best 
of  men,  and  to  array  them  against  us:  when, 
if  we  could  get  their  attention  long  enough  to 
be  understood,  they  might  gladly  assist  in  the 
saving  revolution  required.  Therefore,  these 
wild  denunciations  are  unjust,  suicidal,  "  absurd 
and  ridiculous." 

It  is  absurd  to  "  demand  the  entire  abolition 
of  profits"  unless  you  explain  your  "idea"  of 
what  constitutes  profits.  If  you  mean  the 
gains  over  and  above  compensation  for  services 
(and  I  cannot  think  you  really  mean  anything 
else),  you  place  yourself  in  a  dilemma:  because 
(where  common  money  is  taken  for  service) 
you  never  can  tell  how  much  of  it  constitutes  an 
Equitable  compensation :  —  there  is  no  yard- 
stick, no  common  understanding  to  measure 
by;  and  you  expose  yourself  and  the  holy  cause 
of  Labor  to  ridicule  by  any  such  announce- 
ments. 

129 


JOSIAH   WARREN 

One  of  your  resolutions  says  that  "  It  is  an 
especial  object  of  this  League  to  concentrate 
attention  upon  the  fact  that  property  not 
founded  on  a  labor  title  is  robbery." 

This  is  "ridiculous."  A  piece  of  land  set 
apart  for  each  person  who  desires  it,  is,  I  think, 
the  first  step  in  Civilization  ;  and  the  undis- 
turbed and  exclusive  control  of  it  is  as  neces- 
sary to  Security  of  Condition  as  the  land  itself. 
This  exclusive  use  and  control,  the  lawyers 
call  "acts  of  ownership"  ;  and  thus  the  land 
becomes  owned,  is  property  ;  but  it  is  not 
founded  on  a  labor  title,  nor  is  it  robbery  ;  and 
your  direct  and  persistent  war  on  the  ownership 
of  land,  in  the  most  excusable  view  of  it,  looks 
to  me  more  like  insane  fanaticism  than  anything 
else.  This  may  look  severe,  but  as  I  have 
ascertained  by  repeated  trials  that  you  are  not 
"sensitive  to  criticism"  on  this  point,  nor 
particularly  tender  in  your  published  remarks 
on  other  people,  I  make  no  apology. 

If  anything  could  be  more  damaging  than 
this  to  Labor  Reform,  I  think  it  is  your  propo- 
sition to  "restore  all  existing  wealth  to  its 
130 


APPENDIX 

proper  owners  "!  This,  coming  from  an 
Anti-war-under-any-circumstances-man,  defies 
all  rational  criticism.  If  this  is  reform,  I  refuse 
to  be  classed  as  a  Reformer  ;  indeed,  I  have  for 
many  years  objected  to  being  so  classed,  because 
my  convictions  are  so  different  from  what  are 
commonly  called  reforms.  Nor  do  I  consent  to 
being  considered  as  belonging  to  any  particu- 
lar class  or  party:  I  am  simply  an  INDI- 
VIDUAL, and  prefer  to  be  free  to  approve 
or  disapprove,  as  measures  are  presented. 

You  say  you  "  read  my  '  Few  Words  to  the 
Pioneers '  with  indignation. "  Others  have  read 
them  with  admiration.  Here  again  we  meet 
the  defects  of  abstract  language:  we  can  find 
none  that  is  not  subject  (without  the  greatest 
care)  to  different  interpretations  by  different 
minds.  You  interpreted  my  "Ogre"  to  mean 
Freedom  itself,  while  I  intended  to  personify 
the  headlong,  undiscriminating,  irresponsible 
lewdness  that  sometimes  pursues  its  own  ends 
without  regard  to  consequences,  and  which 
the  vulgarity  of  "Mrs.  Grundy"  and  her 
mercenary  press  immediately  impute  to  anyone 
131 


JOSIAH   WARREN 

who  makes  the  least  effort  to  mitigate  the 
tyrannies  and  horrors  growing  out  of  the 
aggressive  Marriage  Institutions.  My  "  Ogre," 
then,  is  not  Freedom,  but  the  enemy  of  the 
freedom  of  speech  and  of  experiment,  and 
consequently  the  enemy  of  knowledge. 

I  feel  mortified  that,  having  done  my  best 
to  paint  a  landscape,  I  am  obliged  to  label  it, 
This  is  a  Landscape. 

In  the  holy  word  Freedom  we  encounter  the 
anxious  world's  greatest  problem,  one  which 
waits  for  solution  in  a  definition  acceptable 
to  all  ;  but  the  defects  of  abstract  language 
have  baffled  all  attempts  to  furnish  one.  Almost 
with  fear  and  trembling  I  ventured  years  ago 
to  offer  one,  on  condition  that  I  should  preserve 
my  freedom  to  change  it  whenever  "  increasing 
knowledge"  should  show  its  defects  ;  and  I  gave 
the  "SOVEREIGNTY  OF  EVERY  INDI- 
VIDUAL over  his  or  her  Person,  Time,  Prop- 
erty, and  Responsibilities"  ;  and  I  here  add, 
Reputation. 

It  seems  to  me  that  consistent  regard  to 
this  Justice  would  secure  exemption  from  the 
132 


APPENDIX 

unnecessary  interference  with,  or  unwelcome 
disturbance  of,  those  who  sacredly  regard  this 
right  in  others  ;  but  that  the  wanton  disregard 
of  it  places  the  invader  under  the  discretion 
and  at  the  mercy  of  the  invaded  and  subjects 
his  own  Sovereignty  to  violation  in  being 
resisted  and  driven  back.* 

In  this  very  article  that  you  read  "with 
indignation"  I  complimented  all  the  "forlorn 
hopes"  as  highly  as  I  knew  how,  for  their  noble 
self-sacrificing  devotedness  in  battling  against 
the  hideous  Grundy  "Ogre"  that  has  so  long 
made  social  life  a  prolonged  Nightmare  by  its 
crude,  impertinent  meddling  in  private  affairs, 
where  no  one's  rights  of  person,  property  or 
reputation  have  been  invaded  and  where  no 
interference  is  welcome. 

You  charge  me  with  "evasion,"  and  the 
"persistent  neglect  of  the  social  question" — 
the  subject  of  Marriage  ;  and  imply  that  I 


*  He  reserves  the  right  to  resist,  by  force  if  neces- 
sary, aggression  or  invasion.  His  conception  corresponds 
with  Herbert  Spencer's  definition.  "  Every  man  is  free  to 
do  that  which  he  wills,  provided  he  infringes  not  the 
equal  freedom  of  any  other  man." 

133 


JOSIAH   WARREN 

"have  much  to  learn"  on  that  subject.  In 
the  first  place,  it  is  myself  —  not  you,  nor 
anyone  else  —  that  is  to  select  the  subject  that 
shall  employ  my  time  and  absorb  my  energies  ; 
but  I  was  studying  that  subject  at  the  age  of 
sixteen,  at  least  ten  years  before  you  were 
born.  It  was  evident  that  there  was  something 
frightfully  wrong  somewhere  ;  but  what  it  was 
I  did  not  see.  However,  about  twelve  years  ago 
I  came  to  some  conclusions  that  relieved  my 
anxieties,  and  that  have,  ever  since,  remained 
undisturbed. 

One  of  these  conclusions  is,  that  with  the 
sudden  and  total  abolition  of  all  Marriage 
customs  and  habits,  without  replacing  them 
with  some  definite,  regulating,  preserving 
thought  and  arrangement,  our  social  condition 
would  be  worse,  if  possible,  than  it  is  now. 

As  I  have  before  intimated,  I  believe  it 
possible  to  avoid  the  oppressions  of  aggressive 
institutions  on  the  one  hand,  and  the  disastrous 
effects  of  inexperience  on  the  other.  But  I  will 
not  attempt  to  state  the  mode  in  a  few  hasty 
abstractions  that  must  of  necessity  be  more  or 
134 


APPENDIX 

less  imperfect,  to  be  flippantly  pooh-poohed 
at  and  set  aside  on  the  first  glance  at  its  extreme 
simplicity,  nor  will  I  put  it  into  print  at  all, 
to  fall  into  the  dirty  hands  of  the  "Ogre"  ; 
but  as  opportunities  offer,  I  submit  the  thoughts 
in  my  own  time  and  way  to  careful,  cultured, 
patient  enquirers,  for  their  criticisms,  and 
acceptance  or  rejection.  But  while  I  honor  the 
generous  sympathies  that  inspire  the  wide- 
spread and  earnest  protests  against  the  enslave- 
ment of  Women,  Men  and  Children  under  the 
prevailing  aggressive  institutions,  I  take  no 
very  active  part  in  demolition,  as  that  work 
is  already  being  done  faster  than  remedies 
follow. 

JOSIAH  WARREN. 

Princeton,  Mass.,  July,  1873. 


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